
Class __ _L£3A1I 
Book___ .YJ^ 



MIAMI UNIVERSITY BULLETIN 



Series XX, No. 7 ' April, 1922 



THE ACHIEVEMENT 



OF 



SUBNORMAL CHILDREN 



IN 



EDUCATIONAL TESTS 




By J. E. Wallace Wallin, Ph. D. 

Director Bureau of Special Education 
(Subnormal and Delinquent Children) 
Teachers College of Miami University. 



( tbf 



THE ACHIEVEMENT 



OF 



IN 



r-j. 



By JfEf Wallace Wallin. Ph. D. 

Director Bureau cf Special Education 
(Subnormal and Delinquent Children) 
Teachers College of Miami University. 



LC 3?g/ 

.^3 



CONTENTS 



Page 

Introduction 3 

Chapter 

I. The Achievement of Subnormal Pupils in the Spelling Tests 7 

II. The Achievement of Subnormal Pupils in the Gray Oral Reading Test 37 

III. The Achievement of Subnormal Pupils in the Spiral Arithmetic Exercises. 64 

(2) 



LIBRARY OF congress" 

RECEIVED 




rz.^^ 9 1924 



INTRODUCTION 



The first public school classes instituted for mentally subnormal children were 
intended for the feeble-minded. The first class was estabhshed in the public schools 
of the city of Halle, Germany, in 1859. The development of these classes was at first 
very slow.* Austria did not establish any public day classes until 1885 (in Vienna), 
England until 1892 (in Leicester and London), the United States until 1896 (in 
Providence), France until 1909 (in Paris), and Canada until 1910 (in Toronto). 

Usually at first the pupils were assigned to these classes on the recommendation 
of the school medical inspectors, the principals and the teachers, without any special 
examination to determine whether the child's pedagogical retardation was due to mental 
deficiency or to any one of a number of other causes, such as lack of interest or 
application, late entrance in school, frequent absences or transfers, physical defects 
or illness, specific mental or pedagogical defects, defects in the course of study itself, 
incompetency on the part of the teacher, lack of en rapport between the pupil and the 
teacher, etc. The determination of the relative influence of the various factors 
which conceivably were causally related to the child's pedagogical incompetency was 
left to the common sense appraisal of the teaching and medical staffs of the schools. 
Where the final selection was entrusted to the school physician, it is probable that his 
judgment was primarily based on the teachers' reports and only secondarily on the 
results Of the physical examination and the sketchy mental examination which 
the examiner could give by means of a few common-sense questions. 

The unsatisfactory nature of this common sense method of selecting the pupils 
who should be assigned to the classes for mental defectives, gradually became recog- 
nized and led Binet, the brilliant French psychologist and child study expert, to develop 
a scale of intelligence by means of which it would be possible for the trained exam- 
iner to determine approximately by a series of simple, uniform and objective tests the 
child's general level of intelligence, or his degree of intelligence retardation. Binet 
recognized that the very essence of feebie-mindedness was intelligence deficiency, and 
that no child could be considered feeble-minded and subject for assignment to a 
special school unless he were genuinely deficient in intelligence by a certain amount 
(not definitely specified by Binet) no matter how little he knew or how unstable 
he might be in his emotional or motor reactions. This scale, which was first offered 
by Binet and Simon in 1905 and revised by them in 1908 and 1911 and which has 
passed through a number of other revisions in this country and elsewhere, speedily 
won almost universal recognition, and fairly revolutionized the method of selecting 
pupils for the special classes for mental defectives, and greatly stimulated the develop- 
ment of these classes. In fact, it practically superseded all other methods of selection, 
because of the recognized superiority of a uniform, objective scale, no matter what its 
defects might be, as compared with the subjective judgment of the individual exami- 
ners. The popularity of this scale is largely responsible for the development and 
extension of group intelligence testing, which has reached its highest development in 
the army tests, and also for the present-day popularity of mental testing in general. 

Unfor tunately the general employment of the Binet scale for the selection of pupils 

,. . *We have discussed the development of public day classes for subnormals and psycholoKical 

Sr'-T917'^[Srfn?)ript2"lT3t;.^28 ''"' ^^^ ''■'''• '''■'''■' ^"'^ "^^^ Mental Health Vthe sXS 

3 



4 Miami University 

for special classes for mental defectives has not been an unmixed good, due less to 
the assumptions made as to the accuracy of the original or revised scales than to the 
arbitrary standards of mental deficiency which have been widely followed, and to the 
overconfident claims as to the diagnostic possibilities of the scale in the hands of 
anyone who could administer it. The arbitrary intelligence standards of mental defi- 
ciency which have been frequently followed, have resulted in the assignment of many 
pupils to the special classes for mental defectives who are not feeble-minded, as 
frequently proved by their after-careers. The majority of those who have used the 
scale have had little training in science and often little or no scientific or practical 
knowledge of feeble-mindedness, and of the differential diagnosis between feeble- 
mindedness and various allied mental handicaps, such as backward or borderline 
degrees of intelligence, visual, auditory and motor aphasia, various speech disorders, 
specific sensory deficiencies ranging from deafness and blindness to semi vision and 
semi hearing, specific pedagogical defects, or psychopathic and psychotic tendencies. 
In the vast majority of public school studies of mental deviates no mention whatever 
has been made of most of the deficiencies which must be differentiated from feeble- 
mindedness. In consequence many children have been assigned to special schools 
for the feeble-minded, who are specificaliy or otherwise mentally handicapped and who 
have ranged in general intelligence from normal to merely backward or borderline, and 
who should have been assigned to other types of classes. We could cite many illustra- 
tive cases. 

Fortunately the situation is gradually improving. It is now becoming recognized 
that no one is fully competent to differentiate different types of mentally and education- 
ally deviating children for different types of special classes who has not made a 
thorough study of the psychology and pedagogy of the different types, who is not an 
expert on m.ental tests, and who does not have a general background of knowledge of 
physical diagnosis, if physical examiners are not available. In other v/ords, competent 
examiners of mentally and educationally abnormal school children are doctors of psy- 
chology (clinical psychologists) who have specialized for several years on these children, 
and doctors of medicine who have spent several years in the intensive technical study 
of not only these children but of experimental, educational and genetic psychology and 
mental tests. Anyone without this preparation must be classed as an amateur in this 
particular field of educational service. Amateurs, however, can be trained to administer 
tests satisfactorily; they are capable of becoming very excellent mental testers; but 
they should not attempt to make anything but rough classifications of cases. 

In contrast to the enormous extension of the psychological testing of subnormal 
children, little attempt has thus far been made to determine the status of subnormal 
children in educational tests, due probably, first, to the fact that the development of 
standarized educational group tests on any scale followed the development of 
psychological tests for individual examination (although it preceded the employment 
of group psychological tests on a large scale);* and, second, to the fact that the use of 
educational tests for purposes of diagnosing mental deficiency is entirely secondary to 
the use of psychological tests. Educational tests measure accomplishment or 
achievement rather than capacity, while psychological tests measure capacity — ideally 
inherent or native capacity rather than accomplishment. This contrast while not 

•The writer devised a series of group psychological tests as eaily as 1910, which have been used 
in testing children receiving dental treatment (Experimental Oral Euthenics, Dental Cosmos, 1912, 
404ff, and 545ff; and The Mental Health of the School Child, 1917, pp. 275-299, 313), and in measuring the 
mental differences between epileptic and normal children, as yet available only in Problems of 
Subnormality, 1917, pp. 350-381. 

Other psychologists also used series of group intelligence tests many years ago, but such tests 
never came into wide usage before the organization of psychological work in the army a few years 
ago. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 5 

literally true, is in the main correct. Nevertheless, educational tests have been very 
widely employed throughout the schools of the country several years in order to 
determine the proper grade placement of the pupils and the special attention which 
they should be given in the various subjects, and certainly we will not have an 
adequate picture of subnormal children until we have measured their educational 
achievements as well as their mental efficiency. It is, therefore, a matter of surprise 
that no special public schools for mental defectives either in this country or in Europe 
have thus far, so far as the writer is aware, been surveyed by standarized educational 
tests. Small groups of feeble-minded children have, no doubt, been tested, but in the 
surveys of school systems made in this country in which standarized educational tests 
have been employed, the tests have not been applied to the mental defectives who 
have 'been in segregated classes. In the recent St. Louis survey, educational tests 
were extensively used, but the special schools were not included. In April, 1918, we 
published indeed a survey* of the pedagogical status of the pupils in the St. Louis 
special schools for mental defectives, but the pupils' ratings were based upon the 
grade classification given them before assignment by the teachers in the elementary 
schools and the classification given them after assignment in reading and arithmetic 
by the teachers in the special schools. 

The present study should have a two-fold significance for teachers, superintendents 
of schools, psychologists, physicians and mental hygienists interested in the study and 
training of feeble-minded and backward children: first, it is the only survey thus far 
made by several standardized educational tests of pupils enrolled in special schools 
for mental defectives; second, most of the pupils tested had been psychologically 
examined and differentially diagnosed, so that it is possible to analyze the results from 
the educational tests with reference to the children's intelligence age, to their diagnostic 
classification, such as imbeciles, morons, borderHne, backward, visual aphasia cases, 
etc., and to the grade assigned them by the special school teachers. 

One of the chief values attached to our comparison of the results in the educational 
tests with the diagnoses arises from the fact that each child assigned to the special 
schools by the writer had been thoroughly studied both before and since the admission 
from the standpoint of the physical, mental, educational, and social conditions, while, 
we have tried to be fairly cautious and conservative in our diagnoses, particularly regard- 
ing the diagnosis of feeble-mindedness. Our results should therefore be of value to the 
practical school man in assisting him to check up the admissions to classes designed 
specifically for mental defectives. We have found that children assigned to such 
classes and to state residential institutions vary enormously in their pedagogical attain- 
ments, some doing work in the upper elementary grades.f We are strongly convinced 
after years of first hand investigation that it is undesirable to assign children to classes 
for mental defectives who are not feeble-minded ( certainly if they grade above the border- 
line status) whenever it is possible to have two or more special classes.J If our conclu- 
sions reached after a decade of intensive first-hand study of the problem are correct, 
it will be necessary to restrict the admissions to classes for mental defectives far more 
rigidly in future than has been done in the past in this country, if we wish to do the best 
work for the individual mental deviate made possible by the present state of the science 
of corrective pedagogy. This study is in harmony with the conclusion which we had 



-.rs^c 'The Pedagogical Status of the Feeble-minded School Children, The Elementary School Journal 
1918, pp. 588 to 597. 

+Problems of Subnormality, 1917, 34f , 86f . 

tibid, 64f^ Meeting the Needs of the Mentally Handicapped Child in School, Ohio Bulletin of 
Charities and Correction, 1919, June, and Journal of Education, 1919, pp. 227f. 



6 Miami University 

already reached that only about one-half of one per cent of our elementary pupils should 
be assigned to the special schools for the mental defectives while the other types of 
mentally subnormal pupils, probably amounting to from 3% to 5% of the elementary 
registration in the average school system, should be assigned to other types of special 
classes, particularly ungraded classes of the type we have described in Problems of 
Subnormality, Chapter III. 

We have given a considerable number of individual case histories of extreme 
deviates and special types, which will add concreteness to the discussion. 

The following tests were used in the present investigation: lists A to F and I, L, 
and O in Ayres' spelling scale,* and lists I and II in Starch's spelling scale;! Gray's oral 
reading scale;t and the spiral arithmetic exercises adapted from the standard Courtis 
tests, which had previously been given to grade pupils in Grand Rapids, Cleveland and 
St. Louis§ (modifications of moment were made in section K in the Cleveland 
survey). 



*Ayers, Leonard, P. A Measuring Scale for Ability in Spelling. Russell Sage Foundation, 1915. 
tStarch, Daniel. Educational Measurements, 1916, p. 89f. 

tGray, William Scott. Studies of Elementary School Reading through Standardized Tests, p. 33, 
undated. 

^Counts, George S. Arithmetic Tests and Studies in the Psychology of Arithmetic, 1917, p. 8f. 



/ 
CHAPTER I. 



THE ACHIEVEMENT OF SUBNORMAL PUPILS 
IN THE SPELLING TESTS 

The tests were given by the different teachers in the St. Louis special schools 
during the months of January and February, 1918. Oral and written instructions, in 
conformity with the author's directions, were first communicated by the writer to the 
teachers giving the tests. The necessity of guarding against copying was especially 
emphasized, as well as the fact that the pupils should not be drilled on the words in 
the selected lists before the tests were given (we have since then, however, based part 
of the spelling lessons on the Ayres lists). The Ayres lists were given on the first day, 
Starch I on the second day, and Starch II on the third. 

The instructions were to give 20 words each in columns I, L, and O in the Ayres scale 
to all the pupils who could spell any of the words in these columns, and all the words 
in lists A to G to all the other pupils. When the data were received analysis showed 
that the number given column G varied so greatly (from 3 to 27 words) that it is not 
worth while to include the results from this list, that many pupils were not given lists 
I, L and O who, as shown by the results, should have been tested on these words, that 
other pupils who did poorly in these lists were not tested at all on the easier lists, and 
that a considerable number of pupils were not tested at all, as shown below. Because 
of the considerable variation in the number tested on the different columns, it seems 
desirable, even at the risk of unduly increasing the amount of tabular matter, to give 
the number of boys and girls tested on each list. The unevenness of the number tested 
on the different lists gives rise to disturbing complications to which we shall later direct 
attention. 

Two hundred and fifty-nine different pupils (171 boys and 88 girls) were given the 
Ayres lists, and 237 the Starch lists (160 boys and 77 girls), while it was reported that 
20 boys and 5 girls of those given the intelligence examination in the clinic were not 
tested because they were unable to spell, or because they had not been taught to spell, 
or because they were unable to write. Of these children six had an intelligence age 
(Binet-Simon) of III, seven of IV, eight of V, two of VI and one of VII, one was 
undetermined, while 16 had been diagnosed as imbeciles, one as a potential moron, 
two as morons, and one each as potential feeble-minded, borderline and deferred. 
The number registered in the special schools the last week of January, 1918, was 372, 
hence it is evident that many children were not tested who were neither reported as 
absent nor as unable to take the test. This omission is unfortunate, for it limits our 
results to a selected group, the best spellers in the schools at the time of the test- 
As indicated, the instructions provided that all pupils should be tested on some lists 
irrespective of their attainments. 



Miami University 



The average chronological age and the average number of years in school at the 
time of the spelling test were as follows: 

DIAGNOSES 





Imbeciles 


Pot. 
Morons 


Morons 


Pot. 
Feeble- 
Minded 


^°lSl" Deferred 


Chron. Age 

Years in School 


1 
11.7 10.0 
3.3 "> 1^ 


11.0 
2.4 


8.3 
3.4 


80 
1.1 


7.8 
2.5 











BINET-SIMON AGES 





Ill 


IV 


V 


VI 


VII 


Chron. Age — 

Years in School 


11.2 
3.5 


11.5 
2.2 


9.2 
2.3 


13.5 
7.4 


13.8 
2.7 



To those who are unfamiliar with the above diagnostic terms, let us explain that 
the imbecile represents the lowest grade of feeble-minded child who ordinarily gets into 
the public schools, having an intelligence age of from three to six or seven according 
to the Binet-Simon tests, while the moron represents the high grade feeble-minded 
individual, varying in intelligence age from seven or eight to nine years, or very rarely 
ten years. It is customary to use Roman numerals to indicate the Binet-Simon or 
intelligence age. Potential morons grade as imbeciles at the time of the examination, 
but probably have sufficient potentiality for mental growth to eventually develop to the 
status of morons. On the other hand, the potential feeble-minded while not certainly 
feeble-minded at the time of the examination, give evidence of having very limited 
potentiality for mental growth, and probably will eventually prove to be feeble-minded. 
Some of those included in the borderline group will also eventually stagnate in the 
feeble-minded class, others will remain on the borderline slightly above the feeble- 
minded status, while others will prove to be merely backward or dull. Those who are 
classed as backward are clearly not feeble-minded, but they are just as clearly not 
normal. A few may be restored to normality by proper physical and educational 
treatment but the vast majority will always remain subgrade in general intelligence, 
although if given approprate training they may be made very efficient in certain fields 
of work particularly along manual lines. VV^'e apply the term retarded to pupils who 
are less behind mentally than the backward. Most of these children if given proper 
attention can be restored to normality. We use the term subnormal as the generic 
concept applying to all of the above classes. In the case of the deferred we have, for 
one reason or another, reserved our diagnosis. We shall later discuss the technical 
application of the concept of feeble-mindedness. For a discussion of the psychometric 
standards of mental retardation on the basis of which we differentiate between various 
groups of subnormals, consult our Problems of Subnormality, pp. 110-277, and The Value 
of the Intelligence Quotient for Individual Diagnosis, Journal of Delinquency, 1919, pp. 
109-124. In these two references citations will be found to the important literature 
bearing on the topic. Here we content ourselves with the statement that the dif- 
ference between the subgroups of mentally subnormal children is quantitative rather 
than qualitative. 

The results of the tests have been tabulated in a threefold manner: first, accord- 
ing to the pupils' school grade; second, according to the intelligence or Binent-Simon 
(B.-S.) age; and, third, according to the intelligence diagnosis. The pedagogical classi- 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 9 

fication is based upon the grade assigned the pupil in reading when the reading tests 
were given two or three months later in the year. At the time of the spelling test the 
teachers did not report the grade the pupils had reached in their daily spelling work, 
nor have they generally graded the pupils in spelling in their annual reports to the 
psycho-educational clinic, owing to the fact that their grade standards in spelling are 
not very definite, partly because they have devoted less attention to the formal teach- 
ing of spelling than to the teaching of reading and number and partly because they 
have not followed very closely the spelling lists which have been used in the regular 
grades in the St. Louis Schools. The only basis on which we could grade the pupils, 
therefore, was the grade reported in reading. The grade in spelling probably approxi- 
mates the grade in reading more closely than the grade in, say, arithmetic. But it 
must be emphasized that the correlation between proficiency in spelling and reading is 
not by any means perfect. Some pupils read beautifully but spell miserably, while 
some pupils spell well, at least orally, but read poorly. The pedagogical grading, there- 
fore, is only a rough one. 

The Binet-Simon age is based on the Stanford revision for pupils examined in the 
psycho-educational clinic since September, 1917, and on the 1911 edition (Vineland) of 
the old scale for pupils tested prior to this date. Of the pupils given the Ayres lists 52 
were graded by the former as against 141 by the latter revision, while for the pupils 
taking the Starch lists the corresponding figures are 46 and 127. All the intelligence 
examinations (as well as the diagnoses) were made by the writer. Since the Binet age 
relates to the time when the pupils were given the intelligence examination, and not to 
the time when they were given the spelling tests, we have given the average chrono- 
logical age both at the time of the Binet-Simon examination and at the time of the 
spelling tests. The "number of years in school" applies to the date when the spelling 
tests were given, but the figures given in the tables are only approximately accurate. 
In many cases the records were so incomplete that the age in school could not be 
ascertained at all, while in other cases the records were probably only approximately 
correct. It is particularly difficult to determine how long a child has been in school 
if he has attended a number of public and private schools. 

Many pupils who were given the spelling tests had been admitted to the special 
classes before the psycho-educational clinic was estabHshed. No Binet-Simon records 
or diagnoses are available for these pupils, and they are therefore excluded from the 
tabulations according to Binet-Simon age and diagnosis. 

ANALYSIS OF RESULTS 
RELATION OF SPELLING ACHIEVEMENT TO ASCENDING CATEGORY 
No one who was classified as of kindergarten or lower grade was given the 
spelling tests. This makes it impossible to determine the number of words which they 
might have spelled had they been tested. However, many, perhaps most, of these 
pupils had been given very little formal instruction in spelling, because of their low 
mentality. On the other hand, the pupils with a B.-S. mentality of III and IV years 
who were tested (a selected lot) scored in all the lists, one (case One, born in St. Louis 
of German-American parents) doing remarkably well in Ayres I, L and O, and fairly well 
in Starch I and II. However, it is necessary to explain that his mental rating of 4.2 was 
obtained in 1914 at the age of 8.16. Undoubtedly he grades higher mentally now than 
when he was tested, and the same statement applies to all of the other pupils who 
were given the B.-S. tests several years prior to the educational tests. This boy 
practically stood still mentally the first year in school. Since then he has been 
improving steadily. 



10 Miami University 

The spelling proficiency, as measured by these word lists, tends to increase from 
grade to grade, from B.-S. age to B.-S. age, and from intelligence classification to 
intelligence classification, but there are numerous exceptions to this tendency. 

Thus, for the Ayres lists there is an improvement in the grade classification, as 
shown in Table I, with ascending grade in 18 and a decrease in 3 of the 21 possible 
comparisons in the different columns. The average age at the time of the spelling 
test increases slightly with each ascending grade, but the time in school is practically 
the same for the three upper grades. The improvement from grade I to grade II in 
lists I, L and O amounts to 2., 3.2 and .09 words, respectively; from grade II to III, — 
.06 (a loss), 1.3 and 10.5, respectively; and from grade III to FV, 2.8, 6.8 and 1.4, words, 
respectively. It is evident that the improvement from grade to grade is not very 
marked, with one or two exceptions. 

In Table II, where the data are grouped according to B.-S. age, there is an increase 
in 34, and a decrease in 19 of the 53 possible comparisons. Based on the medians. 
Table III, there is an increase in 25, a decrease in 17 and equal scores in 11 of the 
comparisons. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



11 



TABLE I 



NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN THE AYRES SCALE 
TABULATED ACCORDING TO GRADE 







Chron. Age 


c — 










Sex 




at Time of 


o 












25 






to ^ 














, 1 




B.-S. 


Spell. 


^^ 


A 


B 


C 


D 


E 


F 


T 


L 


o 








Test 


Test 
























First 






























Grade 






























Boys 


92 


77 


92 


75 


64 


64 


64 


63 


66 


60 


2b 


25 


25 


Number 


Boys.. •• ■ 




10.01 


11.25 


4.61 


1.49 


2.83 


5.53 


4.93 


8.54 


7.18 


13.4 


9.04 


5.52 


. • Score 


Girls — . 


42 


38 


42 


38 


31 


31 


31 


31 


32 


29 


10 


10 


10 


Number 


Girls 




9.9 
115 


11.25 
134 


4.33 
113 


1.6'/ 
95 


3.09 
95 


5.93 
95 


4.93 
94 


9 19 
98 


8 
89 


9.6 
35 


5.6 
35 


1.5 
35 




Both..... 


134 


Number 


Both 




9.97 


11.25 


4.56 


l.bb 
77 


2.92 
73 


5.66 
80 


4.93 
54 


8 68 
51 


7.44 
41 


12.31 

76 


8.05 
40 


4.37 
22 




Both 






Second 












Grade 






























Boys 


49 


31 


49 


30 


1 


1 


1 


1 


9 


9 


40 


40 


34 


Number 


Boys 




11.15 


13. 


6.29 


1. 


3. 


V. 


8. 


14.44 


lb. 44 


lb. 62 


11.37 


4.7 


.. .Score 


Girls .... 


k 


20 


30 


20 


6 


6 


6 


6 


7 


7 


18 


23 


22 


Number 


Girls ... 




11 94 


13. 


6.4 


2 


3. 66 


V. 


7.16 


14.42 


14.14 


20. VV 


11.3 


4.09 


. . . Score 


Both 


7H 


51 


79 


50 


7 


7 


7 


7 


16 


16 


b8 


63 


56 


Number 


Both 




11 46 


13. 


6.33 


1.85 
93 


3.bV 
89 


7. 
100 


7.28 
81 


14. 43 
85 


14.43 
80 


17.22 
96 


11.34 
57 


4.46 
22 




Both. . 




Per cent 


Third 












Grade 






























Boys 


29 


19 


29 


19 


1 


1 


1 


1 


1 


1 


28 


28 


28 


Number 


Boys 




11. 87 


13. 6 


6.65 


?. 


4. 


5. 


9. 


17. 


15 


17.67 


15.17 


H 5 


. . . Score 


Girls . 


15 


8 


15 


8 


1 


1 


1 


1 


1 


1 


14 


14 


14 


Number 


Girls 




12.2 
27 


14.08 
44 


5. 19 
27 


2. 

9. 


4. 
2 


6. 
2 


8. 
2 


13 
2 


17. 
2 


16.14 
42 


7.63 
42 


27.92 
42 




Both. ... 


44 


Number 


Both..... 




11.93 


13.7 


6 22 


?.. 


4. 


5.5 


8.5 


lb. 


16. 


17.16 


12.66 


14,97 


. . Score 


Both 










100 


100 


79 


94 


88 


89 


96 


63 


75 




Fourth 












Grade 






























Boys 

Boys 

Girls 


1 


I 

14 6 


1 

14 4 


1 
6 34 














1 
20 


1 
20 


1 
16 














. • • Score 
Number 


1 


1 


1 


1 














1 


I 


I 


Girls. 




13.25 
2 


14.5 
2 


7.66 
2 














20 
2 


17 
2 


11 

2 




Both 


9 
















Both 




13.92 


14.45 


7. 














20. 


19.5 


13.5 


■ Score 


Both. 






















100 


98 


68 




Gen. Ave. 
























for all 






























Grades 






























Boys — 


171 


128 


171 


125 


66 


66 


66 


65 


76 


70 


94 


94 


88 


Number 






10.60 


12. 23 


5.18 


1.46 
73 
38 


2.86 
71 
38 


b.54 
79 
38 


5.04 
56 
38 


9.38 
55 
40 


8.35 
46 
37 


15.69 

78 

43 


11. 97 

60 

48 


6.27 
31 

47 










Girls 


88 


67 


88 


67 


Number 


Girls . . . 




10.83 


12.3 


4. 94 


1.7J 


3.21 


61 


5. 36 


9.9 


9.4 


17.25 


11.64 


4. 72 


. . . Score 


Girls 










86 
104 


80 
104 


87 
104 


60 
103 


58 
116 


52 
107 


86 
137 


58 
142 


24 
135 




Both 


259 


195 


259 


i92 


Number 


Both 




10. 68 


12.25 


5.09 


1.56 


2.99 


5.75 


5.16 


9.58 


8.71 


16.1!: 


11.86 


5.73 


. . Score 


Both.... 










78 


74 


82 


57 


56 


48 


81 


59 


29 


Per cent 



12 



Miami University 



TABLE II 

NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN THE AYRES SCALE 
TABULATED ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



Sex 


d 
2 


Chron. Age 
at Time of 




Columns 




B.-S. 
Test 


Spell. 
Test 


A 


B 1 C 1 D 1 E 


F 


I 1 L 







Age III 

Boys 

Boys 


3 

2 
■■4' 
"6 


3 
3 24 

2 

7.6 
4 
8. 11 

6 
7.94 

13 

8.71 
10 

8.95 
23 

8. 82 

30 

9.6 
18 

9 45 
48 

9.54 

38 

10.98 

18 

12 23 

56 

11.38 

34 

11. 87 
14 

12.30 
48 
11- 99 

4 
12.66 

2 
14.13 

6 
13.15 

2 
12.24 

1 
14.6 

1 
7.6 


3 
10 5 

2 
10.79 

4 
10.58 

6 
10.65 

13 

10.44 

10 

10.02 

23 

10. 26 

30 

11.01 
18 

11. 08 
48 
11. 04 

38 

12.12 

18 

13 25 

56 

12.48 

34 

13 16 
14 

13.45 
48 
13.28 

4 

14 5 
2 

14.3 
6 
14.4 

2 
13.33 

1 
14.75 

1 
9 


3 

3 6 

2 

4 8 
4 

3. 26 

6 

3.75 

13 

3.65 
10 

3.26 
23 

3 48 

30 

3.96 
18 

11 25 
48 

4. 06 

37 

5.46 
18 

5.97 
55 

5. 62 

33 

6.35 
14 

6 63 

47 
6.55 

4 

6.77 

2 

3.25 

6 

5 6 

2 

7.04 

1 
65 

1 
2.5 


3 

1.3 
65 

1 
2 
4 

15 
5 

1 6 
85 

11 

154 

8 

1.35 
19 

1.47 
74 

19 

1.42 
13 

1.76 
32 

156 
78 

18 

1 61 

5 

2 
23 

1.69 
85 

4 

1 75 
3 
2. 
7 

1.85 
93 


3 
2.3 

58 

1 
2. 

4 

3.75 
5 

3.4 
85 

11 

3 

8 

2 35 
19 

2.73 
68 

19 

2.78 
13 

2 92 
32 

2.84 
71 

18 

3 11 

1. 

23 
3.3 
83 

4 

3.75 

3 

4. 
7 

3.85 
96 


3 
5 3 

75 

1 

4. 
4 

6.25 
5 

5 8 
83 

11 

5 27 
8 
5.5 

19 

5. 36 
77 

19 

5.42 
13 

5.76 
32 

5. 56 
79 

18 

5.77 
5 

6 6 
23 

5.95 
85 

4 

6 5 
3 

7. 
7 

6.71 
96 


3 

5.6 

62 

1 
5. 
4 

3 75 
5 

4. 
44 

11 

4.72 

8 

3.75 
19 

4.31 
48 

19 

4.63 
13 

4 69 
32 

4.65 
52 

18 

5 44 
5 

7. 
23 

5.78 
64 

4 
7. 
3 
8. 
7 

7.4 
82 


3 

8.3 
49 

1 
5. 
4 

6 75 
5 

6 4 
38 

11 

8 54 

8 

7.37 
19 

8. 05 
47 

19 

7 05 
13 

7.69 
32 

7.31 
43 

23 
10 
5 

13 6 
28 

10.64 
63 

6 
14.16 

3 
14.3 

9 

14.22 
84 


2 

1 5 
8 

1 
4. 
4 

5.4 
5 

5.2 
29 

10 
7 6 

7 

6. 85 
17 

7.29 
40 

17 

5 82 
12 

6.08 
29 

5.93 
33 

22 

9.4 

5 

10.8 
27 

9.66 
54 

6 

13.3 
2 

14.5 
8 

13 6 
76 








• Number 










Age IV 


1 
20. 


1 

14 


1 

14. 

'l 
14 
70 

2 

16.5 
2 
1.5 

4 
8.75 

44 

11 

6.45 

5 

32 
16 

5.43 
27 

15 

3.33 
13 

3 61 
28 

3.45 
17 

28 

5.46 
11 

5 9 
39 

5.58 
28 

4 

5 25 

1 
11. 

5 

6. 
30 

2 



1 

16. 
80 


. Number 


Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 


■ • . Score 
. Number 


1 
20. 
100 

2 

19 5 

2 
13. 

4 

16.25 
81 

11 

13 72 
5 

16. 
16 

14 43 
72 

15 

13.86 

13 

14.46 

28 

14.14 

71 

28 

16. 14 

11 

16 18 

39 

16.15 

81 

4 
17.25 

1 
20. 

5 

17.8 
89 

2 
5 
25 

1 
20. 
100 


1 

14. 
70 

2 
13 5 

2 
11. 

4 

12.25 
61 

11 

10.27 
5 

12.8 
16 

11 06 
55 

15 

8.93 
13 

10.46 
28 

9 64 
48 

28 

12 1 
11 

12.17 
39 

12.12 
61 

4 
12.75 

1 
19 

5 

14. 
70 

2 
3.5 

18 

1 
20 
100 


• Number 


Both 


• Score 


Age V 


13 


• Per cent 
■ Number 




• . • Score 


Girls.. 

Girls 


10 


. Number 
• • Score 


Both 


23 
30 


Number 


Both.. 

Age VI 


. . . Score 
■Per cent 

. Number 


Boys 


. • Score 


Girls 

Girls . ■ 


18 


Number 
■ . Score 


Both 


48 


Number 


Both 


. Score 


Age VII 


38 

18 


• Per cent 
■ Number 


Boys 

Gii-ls 


. . . Score 
Number 


Girls 


Score 


Both....... . 

Both . 

Age VIII 
Boys 


56 

34 


• Number 

• • • Score 
■ Per cent 

. Number 
• . • Score 


Girls....... . 

Girls........ 

Both 

Both 


14 
"48' 


• Number 

. . Score 

. Number 

. Score 


Age IX 


4 

"2 

6 


• Per cent 

• Number 


Boys 

Girls....... . 

Girls — 














. • • Score 










1 
16. 

1 

16. 
94 


1 
18. 

1 

18. 
100 












Score 

■ Number 












• Score 


AgeX 
Boys 


2 


1 

1. 

50 


1 




1 
2. 
28 




Per cent 

. Number 
■ Score 


Age XI 
Boys — . 


1 


.Per cent 

. Number 
. ■ . Score 


Age Not 
Determined 


1 


Per cent 
Number 
















. Score 






.Per cent 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



13 



TABLE II. (Concluded) 
GENERAL AVERAGES FOR ALL B.-S. AGES 



Sex 



Chron. Age 
at Time of 



B.-S. 
Test 



Spell. 
Test 



Columns 



A B C D E 



Boys . 
Boys ■ • • 
Boys . . . 
Girls 
Girls . . 
Both ... 
Both ■ . 
Both ... 



128 



128 
10.63 



128 
12.01 



126 
5 41 



66 
10 43 



66 
12 08 



66 
4.94 



194 
10.56 



194 
12 03 



192 
5.35 



57 

152 
76 
33 

169 
84 
90 

1.58 
79 



57 

2.9 
72 
33 

3.1i 
78 
90 

3.0 
75 



57 

5.49 
78 
33 

6.0 
85 
90 

5. 67 
81 



56 

5 1 
57 
33 

5.0 
56 

19 

5 06 
56 



63 

9.11 
54 
34 

9.2 
54 
97 

9.15 
54 



58 
7.96 

44 
31 

7 

44 
89 

7 93 
44 



64 

15.14 

75 

32 

15 37 

77 

96 

15.21 

76 



64 

11.01 

55. 

32 

11. 71 

59 

96 

11.25 

56 



64 

5.57 
27 
32 

4.43 
22 
96 

5.19 
26 



Number 
. Score 
Per cent 
Number 
. . Score 
Per cent 
Number 
. . . Score 
Per cent 



No., number of pupils. Chron. (Chronological age), refers to the exact calendar or life age of 
the child. The figures in the lines marked "score" are all averages; the figures in columns three and 
four represent average chronological ages, and in column five average number of years in school. 
Unless stated otherwise the conclusions drawn in the text are based on the average scores. The per 
cents, computed only for the combined scores for the two sexes, were secured by dividing the total 
number of words found in lists A to F and by 20 words each in lists I, L, and O, into the average number 
of words spelled correctly in the different columns. Decimals have been ignored in the quotients. 

These explanations apply to all the tables except Table III. 

TABLE III 

NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN AYRES SCALE (MEDIANS) 

ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



Age 



B 



D 



O 



Age III 
Boys. 

Age IV 
Boys.. 
Girls. . 
Both.. 



AgeV 
Boys 
Girls. 
Both. 



Age VI 
Boys- 

Girls. 
Both. 



Age VII 
Boys . . 
Girls ■ . . 
Both. 



Age VIII 
Boys- . . 

Girls . . . 
Both... 



Age IX 
Boys... 
Girls . . 
Both.. 



AgeX 
Boys 



Age XI 

Boys 



2 
100 



2 
2 
2 

100 



2 
2 

2 
100 



2 

2 

2 

100 



2 
2 
2 

100 



2 

2 

2 

100 



2 

4 

4 

100 



3 

4 

4 

100 



4 
100 



4 

7 

7 

100 



5.5 
7 
7 
100 



7 
100 



5 

3.5 
4 
44 



4 5 
4 
44 



6.5 

7 
7 
77 



7 5 



14.5 

14 

15 



1.5 



13 

14.5 
14 
77 



18 

18 

100 



20 



20 
100 



19-5 
13 

17.5 
87 



16.5 

16 

16 



18 
20 
19 5 
97 



13 5 
11 

12.5 
62 



11 
12 

11.5 
57 



12 
11 

11 5 
57 



3 5 
17 



Ifi 
1.5 
7 5 

37 



5 
2 
3.5 

17 



1.5 
3 
2 
10 



20 



20 20 

100 100 



Number 
Per cent 



■ Number 

• Number 

Number 

■Per cent 



■ Number 
Number 
Number 

■ Per cent 



. Number 

■ Number 

■ Number 
Per cent 



Number 
Number 
Number 
Per cent 

Number 
Number 
Number 
Per cent 

Number 
Number . 
Number 
Per cent 

Number 
Per cent 

Number 
Per cent 



The median is the middle measure when all the measures are arranged according to size. 
Number means the number of words spelled correctly. 



14 



Miami University 



The average chronological ages at the time of the spelling test do not increase 
here from B.-S. ages III to V, but show a slight increase upward from age V. The 
average amount of time in school tends to increase slightly, although irregularly, from 
age VI. In view of these facts, it is not without significance that 8 of the failures of 
the scores to improve are between ages III and IV, and IV and V. If we restrict the 
comparison to columns I, L and O, we find that there are more losses than gains, and 
that the improvement where it occurs is very small. The follovdng figures indicate 
the change from age to age in average number of words of gain or loss (the losses are 
shown by a minus sign): 



Column 


IVto V 


VtoVI 


VI to VII 


VII to VIII 


VIII to IX 


I 

L 




-3.75 
—1.75 
-5.25 


-1.82 
-1.19 
—3.32 


— .29 
—1.42 
—1.98 


1.91 
2.36 
1.99 


1.75 
2. 
.56 



One reason why so little correlation between spelhng proficiency and intelligence is 
shown in these columns is undoubtedly the one we have already suggested: the poorer 
pupils in the lower B.-S. ages were not tested on these columns, hence the relatively 
high scores in these ages. Of 6 IV-year olds, 23 V-year olds, 48 Vl-year olds, and 56 
Vll-year olds, only 1, 4, 16 and 28 subjects in these ages, respectively, were tested on 
these columns. 

In Table IV, where the data are averaged according to intelligence diagnosis, there 
is an increase in 29, a decrease in 15 and equal scores in one of the 45 possible 
comparisons of the figures in the different columns between the ascending categories. 
We are not including the "deferred" subjects in whose case the diagnosis was 
suspended and who average younger in age than any other group with the exception 
of the normal, who are also disregarded because the group contains only one subject. 
The following figures show for columns I, L and O the average number of words of 
improvement or loss (minus sign) from classification to classification. 



O 



Imbeciles to Potential Morons 

Potential Morons to Morons 

Morons to Potential Feeble-Minded- ■ 
Potential Feeble-Minded to Borderline 
Borderline to Backward 



-7.2 
6 5 
.5 
2.39 

-2.62 



-8-4 
9 3 
.75 
2 58 

-2.88 



—7 

4.6 
— .25 

2 21 
—2.56 



The results for the potential morons are of no significance as only one of the six 
was given columns I, L and O. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



15 



TABLE IV 

NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN AYRES SCALE 
ACCORDING TO DIAGNOSIS 



Sex 



No. 



Chron. Age at 
Time of 



B.-S, 

Test 



Spell. 
Test 



Columns 



Imbeciles 

Boys 

Boys. - . . 
Girls.... 

Girls 

Both . . . 
Both . - . 



Potential 
Morons 

Boys 

Boys • . . 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



Morons 
Boys . 
Boys • • 
Girls • 
Girls. . 
Both 
Both . 



Potential 
Feeble- 
Minded 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both ... 



Borderline 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



35 



32 



Backward 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both ... 
Both 



Deferred 
Boys. . . 
Boys . . 
Girls... 
Girls- . . 
Both . . . 
Both ■ . . 



Normal 
Girls . . 
Girls.. 



15 

9.12 
12 

9.83 
27 
10.61 



10.72 

3 
10.72 

6 
10.72 



31 

11.94 

17 

12.79 

48 

12.24 



23 

10.02 

12 

10.03 

35 

10 02 



32 

11.03 
8 

12.26 
40 
11.27 



16 
10.21 

6 

9.1 
22 

9.91 



9.35 
7 

9. 05 
15 
9.21 



1 
8.4 



15 

10.97 

12 

11.43 

27 

11.18 



3 
11.2 

3 
10.84 

6 
11.02 



31 

12.92 

17 

14.07 

48 

13 33 



23 

10.41 

12 

10.58 

35 

10.5 



32 

12.78 
8 

13.3 
40 
13.11 



16 

12.5 
6 

11.34 
22 
12.16 



11.25 

7 

9.33 
15 
10. 33 



1 
9.58 



37 



3 

4.5 

3 

2.92 

6 

3.71 



31 

5 93 
17 

6.08 
48 

5.99 



23 

3.34 
12 

4.54 
35 

3.47 



32 

6.12 

8 

5.55 
40 

6 17 



15 

5.69 

6 

4. 72 
21 

5.49 



4.94 
7 

3.34 
15 
4 19 



1 

4.59 



13 

1 38 

9 

1.33 
22 

1.36 



1 
2 
3 

1.66 

4 

1 75 

87 



12 
1.75 
3 



16 

1 31 

7 

1.57 
23 

1 39 



1 37 
1 
2. 
9 

133 
66 



4 
2. 
3 
2. 
7 
2. 
100 



3 
2. 
6 
2. 
9 
2. 
100 



1 
4 
3 

2. 66 
4 
3 
75 



12 

3. 

3 

4. 
15 

3. 26 
81 



16 
2.37 

7 

2 57 
23 

2.43 
60 



3.12 

1 

4 

9 

3.22 



3 
4 
6 
3 
9 
3. 64 
91 



13 
4.92 
9 

5.11 
22 

5. 
71 



1 
7 
3 
6 

4 

6 25 
89 



12 

6. 

3 

7. 
15 

6.26 



16 

4.75 

7 

5.57 
23 

5. 
71 



6.12 

1 

7 

9 

6.22 



4 

5.75 

3 

7 

7 

6.28 



3 
7. 
6 

6.5 
9 

6 66 
96 



13 

4.3 

9 

3. 
22 

3.77 
41 



1 

7. 
3 

3.66 
4 

4.5 
50 



12 

5.91 

3 

7.33 
15 

6.2 



15 
3.73 

7 

4. 28 
22 

3.9 
43 



6 
1 
9 
9 

6 33 
70 



4 

6.25 

3 

7 

6. 57 
73 



3 

7.66 
6 
6. 
9 

6.55 
72 



1 

9. 

100 



13 
6.3 
9 

4.81 
22 

5.7; 
33 



2 
14 

3 

7.33 

5 
10 
58 



14 

9.14 

3 

13. 66 
17 

9.94 
58 



15 

6.73 

7 

7. 
22 

6.81 



11 

11 27 
2 

15.5 
13 

11.92 
70 



5 
13.6 

3 
13-6 

8 
13 62 



3 
14.66 

6 
11 83 

9 

12.77 
75 



1 
17. 

2 

5.5 

3 

9 33 
52 



14 

8.64 

3 

14.66 
17 

9.7 
54 



13 

5 46 

6 

5.5 
19 

5 47 
30 



11 

9.9 

1 

18. 
12 

10.58 
58 



5 
11.2 

3 
13. 

8 

11.87 
66 



2 
13.5 

6 
10. 

8 

10. 88 
60 



2 
19.5 

3 
12.33 

5 

15.2 
76 



2 
13.5 

3 

6.66 

5 

9.4 
47 



17 
14.23 
14 
15.28 
31 
4.7 
74 



7 
15.42 

5 

14. 
12 

14.83 
72 



21 
17. 
6 

18. 
27 

17.22 
86 



11 

14. 
3 

16.66 
14 

14.57 
72 



5 
12.2 

1 
13. 

6 

12.33 
61 



17 

9.64 
14 

11.78 
31 

10.61 
53 



7 
11. 

5 

11.2 
12 

11.08 
55 



21 

13. 66 
6 

13.66 
27 
13.66 



11 
10. 
3 

13.66 
14 

10.78 
53 



5 . 

7.8 

1 
11. 

6 

8.33 
41 



2 

16. 
3 

1. 

5 

7. 

35 



17 

4 88 
14 

4.85 
31 

4.87 
24 



7 

5. 14 

5 

3.4 
12 

4.41 
22 



21 

6 85 

6 

5.83 
27 

6.62 
33 



11 

3.63 

3 

5.66 
14 

4.06 
20 



5 

4.6 
1 

2. 
6 

4.16 
20 



. No. 
Score 
■ No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 



. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 

. No. 
Score 

...Mo 



■ No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 



. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 



. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 



. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 



. No. 
Score 
■ No. 
Score 
. No. 
Score 



. No. 
Score 

.... % 



16 Miami University 

The increase in age from category to category and in the length of time spent in 
school are not constant in this table, and this fact probably accounts in part for the 
numerous instances of non-improvement. Thus the potential feeble-minded, who might 
be assumed to be somewhat more intelligent than those definitely diagnosed as morons, 
did poorer than the morons in every column except I and L. But they had been two 
and a half years less in school on the average than the morons, and averaged 2.8 years 
younger. The fact, again, that the backward did poorer than the borderline in col- 
umns I, L and O may be due to the circumstance that they had been in school two 
thirds of a year less and averaged almost a year younger. Moreover, not all the 
backward or borderline were tested on these lists. Notwithstanding the complication 
due to difference of age and time in school it is probable that the increase would 
have been more marked in the diagnosis classification had less categories been used — 
e. g., if we had merged the imbeciles with the potential morons (who graded as imbe- 
ciles at the time of the intelligence examination, but who gave evidence of possessing 
sufficient capacity to advance to the status of morons), and the potential feeble-minded 
with the borderline. Here, again, it is probably safe to conclude that the reason the 
improvement with increasing intelligence diagnosis was not more marked is the fact 
that the teachers did not test many pupils sufficiently extensively. Some were not 
tested far enough down, while others were not tested far enough up. The pupils in the 
lower classifications tested on I, L and O, were superior to those who were not tested 
on these lists. Had all the pupils been included the scores in the lower classifications 
would probably have been lower, and thus the increase with ascending category would, 
of course, have been more marked. 

With the Starch lists the same process of selection obtained, in fact 26 pupils who 
took the Ayres test were not given the Starch, while only 4 who were given the Starch 
did not get the Ayres. However, since only two Starch lists were used, since the 
number tested in each list differs only slightly and since, in any case, the difference 
in the difficulty of the two lists is not markedly pronounced, we shall be in better 
position to trace improvement with ascending classification with the Starch lists than 
the Ayres lists, although the poorest spellers were not tested. In point of fact, the 
improvement is fairly marked in the Starch lists. 

The improvement from grade to grade. Table V, occurs without exception, and, 
based on the averages of the two columns, amounts to 13.13 words between the first and 
second grades; 9.43 words between the second and third grades, and 18.66 words be- 
tween the third and fourth grades. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



17 



TABLE V 

NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN THE STARCH SCALE 

TABULATED ACCORDING TO GRADE 



Sex 



First Grade 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both ... . 
Both 



Second Grade 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



No. 



Chron. Age at 
Time of 



B.-S. 
Test 



Spell. 
Test 



Years 

in 
School 



82 
' 33' 

'iis' 



Third Grade 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



Fourth Grade 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



General Average 
Grades 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



for all 



160 

77" 

237' 



10.07 

29 

10.52 

97 

10.20 



29 

11.19 

19 

11.85 

43 

11.45 



19 

12.14 
8 

12.2 
27 
12.16 



1 

14.6 

1 
13.25 

2 
13.92 



117 

10 72 
57 

11 24 
174 

10.89 



81 

11.54 
33 

11.92 
114 
11.65 



13.05 
29 
13.0 
77 
13 03 



29 
13.67 

14 

14 25 
43 
13.86 



1 
14.59 

1 
14.5 

2 
14.54 



159 

12. 4 

77 

12 78 
236 

12.53 



66 

4.52 
29 

4.58 
95 

4 54 



28 

6. 12 
19 

6.24 
47 

6 17 



19 

6 49 

8 

5.03 
27 

6.13 



1 

6 34 

1 

7.66 

2 

7 



26 



114 

5 
57 

5.24 
171 

5 26 



List 
I 



77 

6 76 
28 

6.35 
105 

6.65 



46 

21. 19 
28 

18 28 
74 
20 09 



28 

31.03 

14 

27.14 

42 

29 76 



1 
54 

1 
47 

2 
50.5 



152 

15 91 

71 

15.74 
223 

15.86 



List 
II 



75 

9.57 
32 

10.12 
107 

9.73 



46 

23.26 
29 
21.13 

75 
22.44 



25 

30 72 
14 

30 78 
39 
30 74 



147 

17.1 

76 

18.5 
223 

18.02 



I and II 



7.94 
33 

8.27 
115 

8 03 



48 

21 95 
29 
19.84 

77 
21 16 



29 

31.18 

14 

29.35 

43 

30.59 



1 
53 

1 
42.5 

2 
49.25 



160 

16 66 

77 

16.9 
237 

16. 74 



. Number 
. . . Score* 
Number 
• • Score 
■ Number 
. . . Score 



Number 
. ■ Score 
Number 
. • Score 
Number 
■ • Score 



Number 
Score 

Number 
Score 

Number 

• • Score 



■ Number 
Score 

. Number 
■ . . . Score 
. . Number 
— Score 



. Number 
■ ■ Score 
Number 

Score 
Number 

Score 



as 



*The averages for the columns containing the words spelled correctly can also be read 
per cents m the Starch tables. 

The average chronological age increases without exception and the amount of time 
spent in school also increases with one unimportant exception from grade to grade. 

There is no exception among the B.-S. categories, Table VI, except in Age X, 
where the cases are too few to make the results significant, more particularly because 
both of the subjects happened to be pupils with dyslexia (to whom we shall presently 
refer). 



18 



Miami University 



TABLE VI 

NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN THE STARCH SCALE 

TABULATED ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



Sex 



No. 



Chron. Age at 
Time of 



B.-S. 
Test 



SpelL 
Test 



Years 

in 
School 



List 
I 



List 
II 



I and II 



Age III 
Boys.. 
Boys-. 

Age IV 
Boys. . 
Boys . 
Girls ■ 
Girls ■ 
Both - 
Both.. 



Age V 
Boys. 
Boys- 
Girls. 
Girls. 
Both. 
Both. 



Age VI 
Boys. .. 

Boys... 
Girls- ■ . 
Girls . 
Both--- 
Both- . 

Age VII 
Boys- - - 
Boys- - 
Girls. . . 
Girls. , 
Both. -. 
Both--. 



Age VIII 

Boys. 
Boys. ■ .. 

Girls 

Girls... 
Both... 
Both-... 



Age IX 
Boys. . 
Boys- 
Girls- . 
Girls- . 
Both-- 
Both-. 



AgeX 
Boys- 
Boys- 



3 

8.7 



2 

7 6 

2 

7.66 

4 

7-63 



12 
8.67 



8.9 
20 
8.76 



26 

9.64 
14 

9.7 
40 

9.66 



34 

11. 07 
17 

12 82 
51 
11.66 



34 

11.87 
14 

12 3 
48 
11 99 



4 
12.66 

2 
14-13 

6 
13-15 



2 

12-24 



3 

10.47 



2 
10-69 

2 
10.88 

4 
10.83 



12 
10-29 

8 

9 94 
20 
10.15 



26 

14.48 

14 

11.63 

40 

13.48 



12-39 

17 

13-95 

51 

12.91 



34 

13 28 

14 

13.41 

48 

13-32 



4 
14-34 

2 
14 38 

6 
14.35 



2 

13-38 



3 

3 44 



2 

3-74 

2 

2-69 

4 

3-71 



12 

3.62 

8 

3.15 
20 

3.43 



25 

4.34 
14 

4 6 
39 

4.44 



33 

5.47 
17 

(5.31 
50 

5.92 



33 

6 35 
14 

6.47 
47 

6-39 



4 

6.61 

2 

3.09 

6 

5.6 



2 

7 04 



3 

133 



12 

5-5 

8 

5-37 
20 

5 45 



4 
27 

2 
26 

6 
26-66 



8.5 



3 
4 66 



2 
3 5 

4 
5.75 



10 
6.7 
8 

7-49 
18 
7-05 



26 

10. 23 
13 
12 53 
39 
11 



28 

12 92 
17 
18 17 
45 
14 91 



31 

23-22 

14 

22 

45 

22 84 



4 
28 25 

2 
26 

6 
27.5 



2 

13.5 



2 

5.25 

2 

2 5 

4 

3.87 



12 

6.12 

8 

6-43 
20 

6 25 



26 

9 26 
14 

11. 32 
40 

9-98 



32 

11-23 

17 

17 94 

49 

13.56 



34 

23 05 
14 

20 32 
48 
22.26 



4 
27 62 

2 
26 

6 
27 08 



2 
11.0 



. Number 
— Score 



. Number 

— ■ - Score 
. Number 

— Score 
, Number 

— Scare 



Number 

— Score 
. Number 

— Score 
. Nuinber 
Score 



. Number 

- - - Score 
. Number 

Score 
. Number 

- - . -Score 



. Number 

Score 

Number 

- . - - Score 

- Number 

— Score 



. Number 

— Score 
. Number 
■ - - Score 

- Number 
Score 



Number 

- Score 

- Number 

Score 

- Number 
- Score 



. Number 
Score 



The increase (average number of words) from age to age for the 
averages of the two columns is as follows: 



B.-S. Age 


Ill to IV 


IV to V 


V to VI 


VI to VII 


VII to VIII 


VIII to IX 


IX to X 






Increase 


.87 


2.3 


3 7 1 -^ !^ 


8.2 


5.2 


— 16* 






1 





•Loss. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



19 



Based on the medians for the combined figures of columns I and II, 
Table VII, the increases are as follows: 



B.-S. Age 


Ill to IV 


IV to V 


V to VI 


VI to VII 


VII to VIII 


VIII to IX 


IX to X 






Increase 





3. 


1. 


5. 


8. 


6.5 


—16.5* 



*Loss. 

In some ages the increase is greater for the medians, in others for 
the averages. 

TABLE VII • 

■ NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN THE STARCH SCALE (MEDIANS) 
TABULATED ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



List I 



No. Words 



List II 



No. Words 



I and II 



No. Words 



Age III 
Boys • • 

Age IV 
Boys . . 
Girls . 
Both.. 



Age V 
Boys 
Girls 
Both 



Age VI 
Boys ■ • 
Girls.. 
Both.. 



Age VII 
Boys... 
Girls . . . 
Both... 



Age VIII 
Boys — 
Girls . . 
Both... 



Age IX 
Boys . 
Girls ■ . 
Both.. 



AgeX 
Boys. 



2.5 
1 5 
1.5 



5.5 
2. 



5. 
10 
5.5 



9. 
17. 
10 5 



20. 5 

16. 

19. 



24.5 

26. 

25. 



8.5 



35 
5. 



12. 
18. 
13. 



22. 
18. 
20 5 



13.5 



4.5 

2. 

3. 



7. 

10.5 
7. 



11. 

18. 
12. 



22. 
16. 
20. 



26.5 

26. 

26.5 



10. 



The average chronological ages and length of time in school increases, but not 
without exceptions, as we go from the lower to the higher B.-S ages. 

When the results are grouped according to diagnosis. Table VIII, there is an in- 
crease with ascending categories except in two instances, as shown by the following 
differences between the combined figures for the two columns (in average number of 
words): 



Category 


Imb. 
to P. M. 


P.M. 
to M. 


M. to P. 
F.-M. 


P. F.-M. 
to Bo. 


Bo. to 
Back. 




.65 


10. 


-5.9* 


10.4 


—3.0* 







*Loss 



20 



Miami University 



TABLE VIII 
NUMBER OF WORDS SPELLED CORRECTLY IN THE STARCH SCALE 
TABULATED ACCORDING TO DIAGNOSIS 



Sex 



Chron. Age at 
Time of 



B.-S. 

Test 



SpelL 
Test 



Years in 
School 



List I 



List II 



I and II 



Imbeciles 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls. 

Girls- 

Both 

Both 

Potential Morons 

Boys 

Boys. - •■ 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 

Morons 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls ■ 

Girls 

Both 

Both 

Potential 

Feeble-Minded 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 

Borderline 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both. 

Both 

Backward 

Boys 

Boys. .- 

Girls 

Girls 

Both. 

Both 

Deferred 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls — 

Girls 

Both 

Both 

Imbeciles & Potential 
Morons Combined 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls. 

Girls 

Both 

Both 

Potential Feeble- Mind- 
ed and Borderline 
Combined 

Boys. 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 

General Averages for 
all Diagnoses 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



14 

9.51 
11 

9 97 
25 

9-71 

2 

10 35 
2 

11.54 
4 
10.94 

29 

11 97 
17 

12 92 
46 
12.32 



19 

9 99 

9 

10.75 
28 
10-23 

31 
11- 
8 

12-26 
39 
11-26 

15 
10.42 

6 

9.1 
21 
10-05 

7 

9 3 
3 

8.61 
10 
9. 09 



16 

9.61 
13 

10-21 
29 

9.88 



50 

10.62 

17 

11-46 

67 

10.83 



117 

10.71 

56 

11-21 
173 

10.87 



19 
10 
9 
11 
28 
10 68 



29 



31 

12 76 
8 

13.66 
39 
12 94 

15 

12.73 
6 

11.34 
21 
12.33 

7 
11.26 

3 

10.5 
10 
11.05 



16 

11.05 

13 

11.54 

29 

11-27 



50 

11.87 

17 

12-38 

67 

12-0 



117 

12-15 

56 

12-55 
173 

12.28 



14 

4.14 
11 

4-4 
25 

4.25 

2 
3.39 

2 

2-71 
4 
3.05 

29 

5.85 
17 

6.46 
46 

6-08 



17 

3 22 
9 

4 85 
26 

378 

31 
6-14 
8 

5 54 
39 

6.02 

14 

5.83 

6 

4.72 
20 

5.73 

7 

4-84 
3 

3-85 
10 
4.54 



16 

4.05 
13 

4-14 
29 

4 09 



5 10 

17 

517 
65 

6 12 



114 

5 23 
56 

5.2 
170 

5 22 



13 

4.00 
11 

•5 18 
24 

5-0 

2 

6.5 
2 
3 5 



29 

14-31 
15 
18 13 

44 
15 57 



19 

7.89 

8 

11. 
27 

8-81 

26 

20-11 
8 

21.16 
34 
20 35 

14 

IS 42 
6 

13 83 
20 
17 



05 



56 



66 



76 



45 

14-95 
16 

16 06 
61 
15 24 



110 

13.29 

52 

13 51 
162 

13 36 



14 

5-42 
10 

7-7 
24 

6-33 

2 

9-5 

2 

5.5 

4 

7.5 

26 

15.84 

17 

18 94 

43 

17.06 



18 

10. 05 
9 

14 44 
27 
11-51 

30 

20-16 
8 

25-37 
38 
21.26 

13 

21 92 
6 

14 83 
19 
19 68 

5 
11.2 

3 

9. 66 

8 
10-62 



15 

5 87 
12 

1.33 
28 

6-5 ■ 



16 37 

17 

19-58 

65 

17-21 



108 

15 12 

55 

15-65 
163 

15.17 



14 




4.75 


11 


6-68 


25 


5.6 


2 


8 


2 


4 5 


4 


6-25 


29 


15-22 


17 


18-23 


46 


16.33 


19 


8 76 


9 


13.88 


28 


10.41 


31 


20 24 


8 


23-25 


39 




20 


85 


15 




19 


2 


6 




14 


33 


21 




17 


8 


7 




« 


78 


3 




8 


16 


10 




8 


6 


16 




5 


15 


13 




6 


34 


29 




5-68 


50 


15 88 


17 


18-29 


67 


16.49 


117 


14-25 


56 


14 53 


173 


14 


34 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



21 



The failure of the potential feeble-minded to gain over the morons is probably due 
to the fact that they averaged 2.8 years younger at the time of the spelling test and 
had been 2.3 years less in school. That the backward did poorei: than the borderline 
may also be due to the fact that they averaged over a half year younger at the time 
of the spelling test and had been in school almost a third of a year less. Moreover, 
our number of backward cases is quite limited. If we merge the imbeciles and potential 
morons, and designate them imbeciles, and the potential feeble-minded and borderline 
and designate them borderline, there are no exceptions to the rule between the general 
averages. The increase from imbeciles to morons is now 10.6 words; from morons to 
borderline, .16 (the borderline averaged a year and a half younger and had attended 
school almost a year less); and from borderline to backward, 1.3. The backward 
average about a third of a year older at the time of the spelHng test and had been in 
school about a half year longer. 



SEX DIFFERENCES 

The differences in spelling efficiency, as determined by these word lists, between 
boys and girls are not constant and in most instances are quite negligible. There is a 
slight advantage, however, in favor of the girls. When the figures from the Ayres 
lists are arranged according to B.-S. age. Table II, the girls are superior to the boys in 
32, inferior in 12 and equal in one of the 45 comparisons. When the medians are 
compared. Table III, the girls excel in 16, and the boys in 12 comparisons, while the 
scores are the same in 17. In the table containing the diagnoses. Table IV, the girls 
are superior in 32, inferior in 23 and equal in five of the 60 comparisons. In the grade 
tabulation. Table I, they are superior in 14, inferior in 14 and equal in 5 of the 33 
comparisons. In the general averages for all the boys and girls in the tabulation 
according to B.-S. age (Table II), they are superior in 6 and inferior in 3 of the 9 
comparisons, and superior in 7 and inferior in 2 of the comparisons in the tabulation 
according to grade (Table I). The differences are frequently unimportant. The 
following is the amount of difference between the general averages for all the boys 
and girls in each list of words: 



List 


A 


B 


C 


D 


E 


F 


I 


L 







.27 
.17° 


35 
.24 


.56 
.51 


.32 
-.10 


.52 
.09 


1.0 
- .09 


1.5 
.08 


-.33 
.53 


-1.5 


(Table I) 

B.-S. Tabulation 

(Table ID 


-1.35 



The minus sign indicates the girls are inferior. 

Only in the case of columns F, I, and O does the difference amount to one word 
or more in the grade tabulation. In the B.-S. tabulation the difference amounts to as 
much as one word only in column O. In the tabulation according to B.-S. age the sex 
differences are smaller than in the tabulation according to grade in all the columns 
except one. 

The results for the Starch words are discrepant in the different tabulations. 
When the results are averaged according to grade, Table V, the girls excel in 3 and 
the boys in 9 of the possible comparisons for lists I and II and the averages of I and II. 
When averaged according to B.-S. age, Table VI, the girls excel in 8 and the boys in 10 
comparisons. On the other hand, when the results are averaged according to diag- 
noses. Table VIII, the girls excel in 12 and the boys in 6 of the comparisons. When 
the medians are used in the B.-S. classification. Table VII, the girls excel in 9, the 



22 



Miami University 



boys in 6, while the results are equal in 3 comparisons. In the averages for the entire 
group of boys and girls, Table VIII, the girls excel in both lists, but the difference 
between the boys and the girls is negligible, amounting to .22 word in list I, .53 word 
in list II and .22 word in the combined averages for the two lists. While the boys and 
girls had attended school equally long the girls were slightly older. 

In our earlier study* of spelling efficiency among normal children the girls 
surpassed the boys. Rice and Cornman also found the same fact to be true. 

♦Spelling Efficiency in Relation to Age, grade and Sex, and the Question of Transfer, 1911, p. 49 ff. 



COMPARISON OF THE SPELLING ATTAINMENT OF MENTAL 
DEFECTIVES WITH NORMAL PUPILS 

The standards supplied with the Ayres scale do not enable us accurately to gauge 
the relative spelling proficiency of mentally defective children of varying grade of 
mentality, because Ayres' standards do not cover a sufficiently wide range of spelling 
attainment in the different grades, while no standards at all are supplied for the first 
grade even for the lists of easiest words. This makes it impossible to locate on the 
scale the very large proportion of our subjects who did not reach the second grade 
standards, nor is it possible to locate anyone on the scale who spelled less than 50% of 
the words in any column, as no norms below 50% are supplied. Owing to the re- 
stricted testing of the pupils, or the restricted range of norms supplied, no data are 
available for grading pupils below the third grade on the lists above L, or below 
the fourth grade on the lists above O, or below the fifth grade on the lists above R, 
etc. This seriously limits the practical value of the Ayres word lists as a measuring 
scale. For a very large number of our cases, all we can say is that the pupils did less 
than second grade work, or less than third grade work, how much less can only be 
conjectured. Moreover, when we attempt to determine the spelling status of pupils 
by the Ayres scale, pronounced discrepancies often arise according to the list of words 
used. This will appear in the later analyses. It would indeed be hazardous to 
attempt to determine a child's spelling efficiency by a single column in the Ayres scale. 
The chief merit of the scale, provided a sufficient number of lists are used, is that it 
enables us to test the proficiency of children in the spelling of words which are in 
very common use. 

The chief merit of the Starch scale, contrariwise, is that it supplies norms for all 
the elementary grades (I to VIII) for graduated lists of words. The words included 
in Starch's six lists represent a fortuitous selection. The first defined word was 
chosen from every even-numbered page of Webster's New International Dictionary, 
1910, exclusive of all technical, scientific and obsolete words. In each column the 
words are arranged according to size, which corresponds to the order of difficulty, 
according to Starch. He says that experiment has indicated that the spelling ability of 
a child can be accurately determined by the use of any two lists, the mean variation 
amounting to only 2.2 points when two columns are used on two successive occasions. 
"For practical purposes the differences among the six lists are negligible." With our 
subjects, we find that list II is almost uniformly easier than list I. Sometimes the 
differences are quite marked. The differences between the averages of the two lists 
for grades I, II, III and IV are 3.08, 2.35, .98 and 2.5 respectively. For the Binet-Simon 
ages the differences are as follows: 



B.-S. Age 


III 


IV 


V 


VI 


VII 


VIII 


IX 


X 




3.3 


3.7 


1.6 


1.5 


1.6 


1.4 


.9 


5. 







The Achievement of Subnormal Children 
Based on the medians the differences are as follows: 



23 



B.-S Age 


Ill 


IV 


V 


VI 


VII 


VIII 


IX 


X 


Difference 


3. 


3 5 


2. 


2.5 


25 


1.5 


2. 


5. 



With one exception (of no importance because based on too few cases) the 
differences are largest in the two lowest grades and B.-S. ages. 

The steps in the Starch scale are so large in the lower grades that the establish- 
ment of norms for the first and second sections of the classes is indicated. 

The selection of the words for the lists by chance has its advantages, but also its 
special disadvantages. The lists are not particularly suitable for testing the attain- 
ment of mental defectives in spelling, because they are usually given a more restricted 
literary program in order that more time may be devoted to practical forms of manu- 
mental training. Accordingly the instruction and drill in spelling are ordinarily limited 
to words whose meaning comes within the pupils' limited range of comprehension, to 
words occurring in the elementary forms of literary work pursued in the classes and 
to the common words which it is felt mental defectives should be able to spell in the 
limited fields of service open to them after leaving school. 

In comparing the spelling attainments of special school children with normal 
children we are restricted to norms which have been established for the different 
elementary grades. The norms are given on the sheet containing the Ayres scale, and on 
p. 97 of Starch's "Educational Measurements." No norms are available for chronf>- 
logical or mental ages for the normal children. Ayres' results were obtained at mid- 
year, or about the same time that we tested our pupils, while Starch does not state 
when his tests were given. 

In the first grade our average scores were less, in most instances decidedly less, 
than Ayres second grade norms in all the word lists except I, in which the pupils did 
fully as well as the second grade pupils. In List O, where there are no second grade 
norms, they did less than half as well as the third grade pupils. The scores of our 
second grade pupils were below the regular second grade norms in all the columns 
except C, I, and L, in which, respectively, they did as well as third, fourth and second 
grade pupils. In column O they scored not quite half as well as the normal third 
grade pupils. In our third grade the scores were below second grade standard in 
columns C and E, equal to second grade in A, B, D, and F, between second and third 
in L, and equal to grade four in I and O. 

Our two fourth grade pupils scored V on I, grade VI on L and almost grade IV on O. 
One of these pupils (case Two), subject to spastic paralysis, had been assigned immedi- 
ately on entering school (before the clinic was established) in September, 1911, to a 
special school. He was examined in the clinic in February, 1918, at the age of 14.66, 
and graded 11 years by the Stanford revision from the upper base (X) and 10.8 from 
the lower base (VIII), and 11.8 by the 1908 and 1911, the corresponding I. Q.'s* being 
.75 and .80. By the Seguin form board, a motor test, he measured less than 6.5 years, 
the low score being due to the extreme instability of his motor centers, manifest in 
gross tremors of the hand. It was so difficult for him to co-ordinate his nervous im- 
pulses that he could write only in a large, irregular scrawl. He also has extreme diffi- 
culty to articulate because of muscular paralysis. His speech is extremely labored. 
He required 49 seconds to read the selection in Age X, which is read in from 25 to 35 

*TheI. Q. (intelligence quotient) is obtained by dividing the chronological age into the intelli- 
gence age. 



24 Miami University 

seconds by the normal ten-year olds. It was read without error, but with great delib- 
eration, owing to his difficulty of articulation. The physical examination also showed 
that his gait was unsteady and spastic, the patellar reflexes exaggerated, the shoulders 
stooped and the nasal septum deflected. He was born (in the United States, of Ger- 
man descent) with instruments after a labor of 36 hours. The paralysis was said to 
date from birth and may have been due to birth traumatism although no known cause 
has been suggested. He was the first child of parents 27 years of age. In his early 
development he was normal in some things, and slow in others. He cut his first tooth 
at 4 months, sat without support at 12 months, stood at 2 years, took his first steps at 
Z% years, and walked at 4 years. He used single words at 1 year, and short phrases 
at 1>^ years. He had chicken pox at 1 year, measles at 2, and whooping cough at 4. 
The family history was negative. In the June, 1915, report from the special school he 
was reported to be excellent in sensory and mental games, faithful but physically ham- 
pered in physical training, very satisfactory in spool knitting, crude in drawing, with 
little control in writing. He read with intelligence in grade IV, told connected stories in 
good English, wrote poorly but used good thought and expressed himself well, was fair 
in spelling, did IIP in arithmetic (the superscript refers to the quarter), was very ob- 
servant, concentrated well, showed very good judgment, general information was good, 
but he fatigued easily. In the June, 1916, report he was said to have improved in phys- 
ical training, he had become stronger, his co-ordination was better, his loom work 
was good, expression in oral reproductions excellent, and he was doing fourth grade 
work in arithmetic. The June, 1917, report noted further improvement in physical 
training and manual work, but he was not very capable in gardening, he writes a type- 
writer, reads III, IV and IV^ materials, spells in IV^, does arithmetic in IV\ his oral 
reproduction is very good, he has high moral standards, and is inclined to be. too 
serious. In the Ayres I, L and O lists, given in January, 1918, he did fifth, seventh and 
between fourth and fifth grade work, and in the Starch lists he did between fourth and 
fifth grade work in I and almost fifth grade work in II. A short time after the clinic 
examination he was transferred as a backward case in February, 1918, to an ungraded 
class. The report from this school in November, 1918, showed that he was success- 
fully doing V* work, earning grades of G and E, and that he would soon be promoted 
to the sixth grade.* This type of retardate should be assigned to an ungraded class 
instead of a special school for mental defectives. 

The other pupil (case Three, a German-American), classified in the fourth grade, 
was admitted to a special school in January, 1913, before the clinic was established. 
In the school report of June, 1915, at the age of 12, she was said to do excellently in 
all forms of physical training, she was good in sense training and mental games, 
gardening, writing, reading (grade III), oral language, and spelling, she was fair in 
raffia, reed, sewing, knitting and cooking, and poor in drawing and arithmetic 
(grade II). Her greatest capacity and greatest improvement were reported in reading, 
her information was said to be limited, she was reticent, easily influenced, pleasant, 
congenial, well behaved, but extremely nervous. She spent the next year in the 
country, going to school part of the time. In September, 1917, she returned to the 
city and was examined in the clinic. At the age of 13.25 years she graded 8.66 by the 
Stanford-Binet, showing a retardation of 4.59 years and an I. Q. of .65. In the Seguin 
form board she graded 10.5 years by the combined forms and a little over nine by the 
writer's norms.t She read fairly well, finishing the X-year selection in 32 seconds 
without error, and reproduced 13 K memories. The physical examination was negative 



•ii^ February, 1921, he was promoted to High School. 
tPsycho-Motor Norms for Practical Diagnosis, 1916, Table XLIX. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



25 



as well as the developmental history so far as concerns past diseases. She cut her 
first tooth at 1 year, stood alone at 11 months, sat without support at 6 months, took 
her first steps without support at 8 months, walked at one year, but did not use single 
words until she was a year and a half old, nor speak in phrases or sentences until her 
sixth year. She was the twelfth child, having two sisters and four brothers alive, and 
six siblings dead. One brother had previously been in a special school. The family 
history was negative, based on the information elicited from the mother. She was 
diagnosed as a moron of the simple type and reassigned to the special school. The 
June, 1918, report from the special school indicated that she was excellent in physical 
training, good in wood work, domestic activities, gardening, writing, reading (III 
grade), oral and written language, and spelling (III grade), and fair in arithmetic (II 
grade), machine sewing and crocheting. She gave good attention, her general 
information was fair, judgment poor, conduct excellent, she was even tempered and 
sociable, did her best work in reading, and her greatest weakness was "self-conscious- 
ness." In the Ayres spelling test she did fifth grade work on I, almost fourth grade 
on L, and slightly better than third grade on O. On Starch I she did almost fourth 
grade work, and on II almost third grade. In Gray's oral reading test she scored 42.5, 
or almost IP. This girl, in our judgment, would not grade lower than the highest 
grade of the feeble-minded, in fact it is doubtful whether some subjects of the same 
mental and educational status could be classified lower than borderline. However, 
she is perhaps more capable in spelling than in any other literary subject. There 
were six other pupils who had been diagnosed as morons who did about as well on 
the Ayres lists but not quite so well on the Starch lists. The records of these best 
spellers among our mental defectives are as follows: 





(/3 


Age at Time of 


bo 
< 

(A 

CQ 




I.Q. 


w o 


Ayres' Columns 


Starch's Columns 


Case No 




I 


L 


I 


II 




Spell. 1 B.-S. 
Test 1 Test 






% grade 


% grade 


% grade % i?rade 


% grade 


Four 

Five 

Six 

Seven 

Eight 

Nine 


G. 
G 
B. 
B. 
B. 
B. 


14.2 
13.7 
12.5 
12.3 
17.6 
13.0 


13 
12.1 
10.9 
9.7 
15.5 
10. 


8.8 

8 6 

7.4 

7. 

8.4 

7.4 


4.2 
3.5 
3.5 
2 7 
7.1 
2 5 


.63 
.69 
.67 
.71 
.65 
.73 


7.5 

7. 

6 5 

5.5 

8.5 

5.5 


100 V 
95 IV 
100 V 
100 V 
100 V 
100 V 


95 V 
80 IlPA 
70 III 
85-IV 
85-IV 
85-IV 


60 1113^ 
45-III 
55 III 

90— VI 
45-III 
40-III 


46 III 
34 II>^ 

7-1 

5-1 
29 II 
36 11!^ 


35 IIJ^ 

32 II34 

13 11/5 

16 m 

27-11 

33 llH 



'Retardation according to the B.-S. scale. 

All of these pupils except one did fifth grade work on Ayres I, only one reached 
fifth grade and three almost fourth grade on L, while five did only about third grade 
on O. On the Starch lists all varied from first to second grade except one who 
reached third grade. The discrepancy between the Ayres and Starch rating, and the 
rating by the different Ayres columns, is at once apparent. Cases Four, Six, Seven 
and Nine were given the spiral arithmetic test. No one made any scores beyond test 
F, except pupils Four and Nine, each of whom did two examples in J, addition of one 
place numbers, which is somewhat better than the standard for grade IIP, but not 
equal to IIP, Case Four did seven examples in A, 4 in B, 1 in C, and 3 in E and F; 
case Six did 3 in A, and one in E; case seven did 2 in A, and one in C; and case Nine 
did 7 in A, 2 in C and one in E. All of these scores are decidedly below the IIP 
standard for the St. Louis schools*— no norms are available below IIP— except the 
score for case Four in F, which is somewhat better than IIP. No scores were made 
except in the simple addition, multiplication and subtraction tests. Those who were 
given the Gray oral reading test scored as follows: case Four, 48.7 or less than IIP, 

*Judd, Charles H. Arithmetic, in Vol. II, Pt. 5. of Survey of the St. Louis Schools, 1917, p. 192. 



26 Miami University 

according to the St. Louis standards; *case Six, 0; case Seven, 18.7, or considerably less 
than P; case Eight, 45. or less than IP;t and case Nine, 40, or a trifle better than IP. 

It is evident that the ratings in reading and in arithmetic more nearly resemble 
the rating by the Starch than by the Ayres scale, and that, based upon the reading, 
arithmetic and Starch tests not a single one of these mental defectives did satisfac- 
tory all-round third grade work, although they varied in chronological age from 
twelve to seventeen, in B.-S. age from 7 to 8.8 at the time of the examination, and in 
length of time in school from 5.5 to 8.5 years. All of these pupils were born in the 
United States except case Nine (a Jew born in Russia). Cases Four, Five and Six 
were of German descent. 

The average Ayres scores for all the boys and girls, Table I, are below second 
grade standard, in most cases markedly so, in lists A to F, equal to second grade in L, 
between second and third grade in I, and below third grade in O. In the B.-S. ages 
rV to VII the scores are invariably below second grade standard in lists A to F, some- 
times decidedly so. In list I the IV-year old boy, referred to before (case One), did 
fifth and in L and O, fourth grade work. In ages V to VII the average scores in list I 
were equal to second grade or better. In list L the score is between second and third 
grade in ages V and VI, and slightly below second in age VII. In list O the score is 
below third grade, markedly so in ages VI and VII. The Vll-year olds did less than 
second grade on all the lists from A to F except B and C, they did about grade two 
and a half on I and L and less than third grade on O. The IX-year olds made grade 
II in list E, less than grade III on O, grade III on I and L, and IV on F. The results 
for ages X and XI may be ignored because of the limited number of pupils. Moreover, 
the low scores in Age X are due to the special peculiarity of the pupils. These boys 
ranked among the brightest in the special schools, they were merely backward in 
general intelligence but practically imbecilic in spelling and reading. They were 
diagnosed at the time of the intelligence examination as cases of dyslexia who were 
slightly backward in general intelligence. 

One of these boys, case Ten (born in Missouri) at the age of 11.08 was backward 
.4 year from the upper base (X) and 1.6 years from the lower base (VII) by the 1911 
B.-S. scale. By the Seguin form-board he graded 10.5 years by the combined norms, 
and about 9.5 by the writer's norms. The school record indicated that he had been in 
school four and a half years at the time of the clinical examination in May, 1916, and 
had advanced to IF. His greatest interest was reported to be centered in "out door life." 
He was said to have "no ability in any line," but was reported poorest in reading and 
writing, and somewhat better in arithmetic, was often morose, sullen and inattentive. 
No delays were reported in his early devolopment. He was said to have cut his first 
tooth at five months, the fontanelle closed at 1 year (very early), he sat unsupported 
at five months, stood at nine months, walked and used single words at 12 months, used 
short phrases at 18 months, but he seemed somewhat stupid at about the sixth year. 
He had had whooping cough at 2 years, chicken pox at five, and measles at six. He was 
the thirteenth child, five brothers and five sisters being alive, four brothers had died 
and one child was born premature. The family history was reported negative. The 
physical examination indicated anterior nasal obstruction, conjuctivitis, weakness of 
the left ankle, a neurotic condition, and the advisability of a blood examination. He 
was very poor in reading, requiring 2 minutes 30 seconds to read 16 words in the 
Vlll-year selectiont and misreading most of these words. He reproduced four 

•Gray, William S. Reading, in Vol, II, Part 4, of the Survey of the St. Louis Schools, 1917, p. 117 f . 

f The score for III2, 46, strangely, is lower than the score for II*, 47. The differences between the 
scores of the different grades in the St. Louis Survey are frequently so small that it is questionable 
whether the scale measures with sufficient fineness. 

tReproduced in Experimental Studies of Mental Defectives, 1912, p. 130. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



27 



memories. He tested very unevenly by the B.-S. scale. He failed on all except 
No. 41 in IX but passed all except No. 47 in X and No. 55 in XI. He wrote 
very well from copy, but the dictation of "the pretty little girl," produced "The 
pamy little girl," in 24 seconds. In June, 1917, the report from the special school 
showed that he was capable in formal motor and mental games, enthusiastic 
in physical games, painstaking in woodwork, fair in writing, in the four processes 
and in problems in arithmetic, but he graded only about P in reading. He tired 
quickly, but was quick at observation, was cheerful, gentle, kind, exemplary in 
conduct, was considered "superior to the average child coming to the special schools," 
and it was predicted that he "will make good when he goes to work." In the June, 
1918, report,* he was reported enthusiastic in physical games, fair in mental games, 
good in calisthenics, very capable in woodwork although tiring quickly, he has consider- 
able talent in drawing, does third grade work in arithmetic, he knows the processes 
and can comprehend the problem work, but is poor in spelling (about second grade), 
although he tries hard to learn two words a day, and poor in reading (second grade), 
he fails on the simplest v/ords, he is fair in oral language, but poor in written language, 
owing to inability to spell. His best work is in manual training, while his greatest 
improvement has been in woodwork. In the standardized educational tests given dur- 
ing the winter and spring of 1918, he did best in the arithmetic exercises. The follow- 
ing indicates the approximate grades which he made in these exercises, in terms of 
the St. Louis standards. 



Test 


A 


B 


c 


D 


E 


F 


G 


H 


I 


J 


K 


L 


M 


N 


O 


Grade . 


-III2 


III2 


-III2 


-III2 


-III2 


-III2 


-1112 


-III2 


-III2 


4-III4 


+III4 


III2 


IIP 


IIP 


IV2 



It should be explained that the scores in some of the tests cannot be very accu- 
rately located because of lack of norms for the second or third grades, but the grading 
varies from somewhat less than IIP (indicated by minus sign) to grade IIP. He failed 
completely on N and O, but so did the normal third grade pupils on N and the fourth 
grade pupils on O. In Gray's oral reading test, on the other hand, he did decidedly 
poorer, making only 22.5 points, which is considerably below the P standard (38). 
The same weakness appears in the standardized spelling test. In Ayers I, L and O he 
scored 40%, 25% and 0%, respectively, which is markedly below second grade standard, 
while in Starch's first list he made only 12%, a trifle better than first grade (10%) and 
in the second list only 8%, or less than the first grade. Here we find, then, evidence 
of special weakness in reading and spelling which we attribute to dyslexia, i. e., 
a weakness affecting visual images of words which makes it very difficult to teach the 
child to read. This child is in no sense to be classed as a mental defective in spite of 
his very low status in the literary subjects, which is decidedly lower than his general 
intelligence level. We have examined scores of similar pupils who have been assigned 
to special schools for mental defectives, but who, rather, should be assigned to ungraded 
classes for the borderline or the backward, or possibly better still to classes for 
pupils with dyslexia. 

The other boy (case Eleven, born in St. Louis), somewhat more backward mentally 
at the time of the examination, should also be considered as a case of dyslexia, rather 
than of feeble-mindness. His record is as follows: 



•On our form 13-G. 
special schools. 



On this form an elaborate report is made annually of pupils sent to 



28 



Miami University 



At the time of the clinic examination, May, 1917, age 13.4, he had been in school 7 
years, half of which time had been spent in a special school from which he was 
reported for examination. According to the 1908 scale he was backward 2.6 years and 
according to the 1911, 3. years, the I. Q.'s being .80 and .77. According to the Seguin 
form board he graded a little over 9 years by the combined norms and less than 8 by 
the writer's norms (we shall see that he deserves a higher rating by the practical school 
tests). He was somewhat overdeveloped in sitting and standing height, weight, 
spirometry and grip. He spoke with a distinct lisp. The results from the physical 
examination were negative. He required 4 minutes 6 seconds to read the Vlll-year 
old B.-S. selection, but had to be given much aid to get through. His reading was halt- 
ing and mechanical. He could not read "water" or "street." But he was able to 
reproduce seven memories. Our first report from the special school in June, 1916, 
showed that he was excellent in calisthenics and corrective physical exercises, he had 
made very considerable improvement in "advanced construction" in woodwork, he was 
very fine in metal work, he showed great skill in advanced basketry, and great accu- 
racy and skill in loom knitting and in knitting caps and scarfs, he had made some 
improvement in speech, in arithmetic he did third grade work and had advanced about 
half a year during the school year, he was good in oral language but had little power 
in reading, in which he had made only slight improvement. In the next report, June, 
1917, he was said to have made great improvement in physical training, was excellent 
in mental games, very good in rhythmic exercises and in floor, balance and suspension 
exercises, very good in basketry, loom knitting and gardening, good in design drawing, 
good in oral language, good in arithmetic, doing IV- work, good in problems but easily 
confused, was improving in writing, and was poor in reading and spelling, doing only 
about IP. His best record was in manual work. He was observant, and capable of 
logical memory. In the June, 1918, report, he was reported alert, accurate and enthusi- 
astic in physical games, excellent in calisthenics, corrective exercises, woodwork and 
copper, good in chair caning, and writing, very fine in arithmetic, doing fourth grade 
work, improving in reading, but still poor, and very poor in both oral and written 
spelling. He is honest, well-behaved, pleasant, and co-operates nicely. 

In the standardized arithmetic tests given in 1918, he graded as follows: 





A 


B 


C 


D 


E 


F 


G 


H I 


J 


K 


L 


M 


N 
IIP 


O 


Test 
Grade 


-III2 


+III2 


+IIP 


-III2 


-fIII2 


IV4 


-f-III-i 


-III2 


-III2 


_V2 


IV* 


IIP 


-fIII2 


_VI4 



In these tests he grades from about third grade to fifth and sixth grade. The 
total failure on the easier fraction test (H) while he made VI th grade in the more 
difficult fraction test (O), is explained by the fact that he only attempted the addition 
of fractions in the left hand column of H, and failed entirely on this process (he added 
the numerators and the denominators), while in O he attempted three additions, two 
subtractions, three multiplications and one division, and succeeded with the processes 
of multiplication and division. In other words, he could multiply and divide, but not 
add or subtract fractions. On the other hand, in the reading test he was barely equal 
to P, earning 37.5 points, while in Ayres I, L, and O he only made 10%, 10%, and 0% 
respectively, which is decidedly less than second grade, and in Starch I and II 5% and 
19% which, respectively, is equal to less than first grade and between first and second 
grade. Our school reports confirm the conclusion that this boy's progress in the 
literary work has been seriously retarded by his special weakness in reading and 
spelling. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



29 



In both of the above cases the bad spelling is primarily due to dyslexia. The 
relation of dyslexia, (of which "visual aphasia" or "alexia" or "visual verbal amnesia" 
are extreme degrees) to poor spelling has not yet been adequately studied. Had the 
cases reported in the literature of bad spellers been adequately analyzed psychologically, 
it is probable that many could have been resolved into cases of dyslexia or visual 
aphasia.* 

In order to make out a case of "pure" spelling disability we would have to rule out 
the factor of dyslexia or lack of ability in reading, deficiency in intelligence so serious 
that the subject would be incapable of forming the associations involved in spelling, 
and doubtless other factors yet to be determined by the psychological analysis of 
individual cases. Among the pupils examined in the clinic whom we diagnosed as 
high-grade deficients but not as cases of dyslexia, we find a number who made 
unusually low scores in the spelling tests. Had we examined intellectually normal 
children without dyslexia we might have found similar records in spelling. The 
records of eight of these pupils, varying in general intelligence from morons to back- 
ward cases, is as follows: 





Sex 


Age at time 
of 


<4^ 




I.Q. 


Diag- 
nosis 


Yrs. in 
School 


Ayres' Lists 


Starch's 
Lists 


Case No. 


Spell. 
Test 


B.-S. 
Exam. 


D 


E 


F 


I 


L 


O 


1 


II 




G. 
B. 
B. 
B. 
B. 
B. 
B. 
B. 


11 
13.7 
14 3 

11 2 
8.2 
8.1 

12.8 

12 9 


12 1 

12. 

12.2 
8 
80 
8.3 
9.6 

10.2 


7 6 

8. 

7.4 

6.6 

6.5 

6. 

8. 

7.6 


4.5 

4. 

4 8 

1.4 

1.5 

2.3 

1.6 

2.6 


.63 
.66 
.60 
82 
-80 
72 
82 
.74 


Mor.i 
Mor.2 
Mor.3 
Bor.4 
Bor.5 
P,F.-M.6 
Back.7 
Def.8 


48 

61 

8.3 

5 

3.4 

3 7 

5.2 

6.9 








25 


5 


5 


5 

1 
1 
1 
2 

5 
3 


fi 


Thirteen 

Fourteen 

Fifteen 


44 
55 


11 
44 


11 
52 
6 
17 
29 
81 


16 
33 
5.5 
5.5 
16 
44 


4 








7 








1 










1 


Seventeen 

Eighteen 

Nineteen 








1 








3 


10 


5 





5 







lAmerican. ^French descent. ''Italian descent. ^German-Irish; restless. ^German descent; lis- 
per. cpotentialfeeble-minded Jew, born in Russia. ^Bohemian-American; speech obstruction. "^German 
descent. AH were born in the United States, except number Seventeen. Numbers Twelve, Sixteen and 
Seventeen were tested by the Stanford scale, which grades lower than the old scales. 

Although these pupils ranged from eight to fourteen years of age, and had been 
in school from three and a half to eight years at the time of the spelling test, and no 
one graded less than six years mentally at the time of the B.-S. examination, no one 
did even approximately first grade work in the Starch lists, while all did decidedly less 
than second grade work in the Ayres lists, how much less the inadequate norms do 
not permit us to determine. It is noteworthy that all these pupils except one were of 
foreign descent, but all were born in America except one. Possibly the constant use 
of a foreign language in the home may have something to do with the pupils' poor 
speUing. Not more than one of these pupils was able to make any score in Gray's 
reading test. Subject Nineteen scored 33.7, which is below first grade standard. While 
weak in spelling these pupils, therefore, were also very deficient in reading. Of the 
pupils who were given the arithmetic exercises, number Twelve scored 6 examples in 
A and one in E; case Eighteen scored 9 in A, 8 in B, 4 in C, 2 in D, 3 in E, one in F 
and 2 in J; case Seventeen scored 2 in A, and case fourteen one in A and one in E. 
Not more than one subject scored in more than two tests, while practically all the 
scores were markedly below the lowest norms supplied, III-. It is evident that these 
pupils were very deficient in arithmetic also, but the restricted norms do not enable 
us to determine whether the deficiency is as great as in spelling and reading. Never- 

*Since the above was writtena s pecial study of spelling disability has been published: Holling- 
worth, Leta S. The Psychology of Special Disability in Spelling, 1918, p. 105. This is a critical psycho- 
logical analysis of a number of bad spellers. 



30 Miami University 

theless, these pupils were weaker in spelling, and also in reading and arithmetic than 
many other pupils of the same intelligence level and the same amount of instruction. 
The average I. Q. (.72) of this group of poor spellers was actually higher than the I. Q. 
(.68) of the group of good spellers on p. 25, but they had been in school about a year 
less (5.4 years versus 6.7). Although spelling ability is probably a function of general 
intelligence in the majority of cases, the foregoing analyses show that among sub- 
normal children the exceptions are so marked that no prediction could be made from 
general intelligence level regarding the spelling ability of even a pupil who has 
received adequate instruction. 

When the results are averaged for all the pupils who had been examined in the 
clinic (Table II), the scores are below second grade in columns A toF, somewhat better 
than second grade in I and L, and decidedly below third grade in O. Although the 
medians, Table III, tend to be somewhat higher than the averages the differences are 
not sufficiently marked to justify detailed analysis. 

All the imbeciles, potential morons, morons, potential feeble-minded and borderhne 
failed to reach the second grade standard in columns A to F — many of the scores are 
markedly below the second grade standard — while the backward reached the second 
grade standard in only A and B and the "deferred" cases in only A. In column I less 
than second grade work was done by the potential morons and deferred, second grade 
work was done by the imbeciles, morons and backward, and third grade work by the 
potential feeble-minded and borderline. In column L, the imbeciles, potential morons 
and deferred did not reach second grade, the morons, potential feeble-minded and 
backward reached second grade, while the borderline fell somewhat short of third 
grade. In column O the pupils in every classification fell decidedly below the third 
grade norms, how much below the limited norms do not permit us to determine. 

With the first Starch list, the scores were inferior to grade I in our first grade, 
equal to about grade one and a half in our second grade, somewhat less than grade II 
in our third grade and somewhat less than grade IV in our fourth grade. The results 
in the second list are somewhat better than in the first list in the first, second and 
third grades, and a trifle poorer in the fourth grade. 

In the B.-S. classification the averages in ages IV and V are decidedly below 
grade I in both columns, in age VI they are approximately equal to grade I, in age VII 
perceptibly better than grade I— perhaps equal to grade one and a fifth— in age VIII 
about midway between grades I and II, in age IX somewhat below grade II, while the 
dyslexia cases in X did less than grade I on the first list and somev^hat better than 
grade I on the second list. The scores are uniformly lower for the medians. Table 
VII. 

In Table VIII, diagnosis, the scoresTvary from less than grade I to about grade 
one and a half. Only among the morons, borderline and backward in list I, and the 
morons, borderline, backward and potential feeble-minded in list II are the scores 
superior to grade I, but the best averages, for the borderline in lists I and II, are only 
equal to about grade one and a half. 

It is obvious from the above results that the Starch scale grades the pupils per- 
ceptibly lower than the Ayres scale, although, unfortunately, we cannot assign any 
definite grading to anyone doing sub-second work by the Ayres scale. Nevertheless, 
in columns I, L and O of the Ayres list, some of the scores are equal to the third, 
fourth, fifth and sixth grade standards both in the table where the figures are arranged 
according to grade and in the table where they are arranged according B.-S. age. In 
the diagnosis table, however, only the borderline approximate the third grade standard 
in lists I and L. 



The Achievement op Subnormal Children 



31 



VARIABILITY IN SPELLING ABILITY 

Practically all educational tests have shown a very large variation in the attain- 
ments of children classified in the same grade. Frequently the overlapping extends 
through four or five grades. Some children in the primary grades may do as well as 
the average in the upper grammar grades, and some pupils in the grammar grades 
may do no better than many pupils in the primary. 

To show in detail how subnormals vary in spelling proficiency it would be necessary 
to present complete tables of the distribution of the scores in the grade, B.-S. age, and 
diagnosis classifications. This, however, would be impracticable here, both because of 
the expense and the space required to print the data. We are obliged to restrict our- 
selves, therefore, to tabulating the distribution of the scores for column I of Ayres 
and for columns I and II of Starch in one B.-S. age, and to presenting the range (R) 
and the quartile deviation (Q) of the scores, both of which furnish measures of absolute 
variability. The quartile deviation, sometimes called semi-interquartile range, repre- 
sents half of the middle half of the measures when arranged according to size, and is 
found by the following formula: Q= Q3— Qi where Qs and Qi are points on the scale 

2 

above which three fourths and one fourth of the measures fall. The quartile points 
are computed by the same method as the median, which is the second quarter or quartile 
point. The data presented will be confined to the classification according to B.-S. age. 

TABLE IX 

DISTRIBUTION OF SCORES IN COLUMN I OF AYRES SCALE 
ACCORDING TO B. S. AGE 



Sex 



No. 
Words 



1-5 6-10 11 12 13 14 



15 16 17 18 19 20 



Age V 
Boys- 
Girls- 
Both. 



Age VI 
Boys . 
Girls . . 
Both.. 



Age VII 
Boys... 
Girls . . 
Both .. 



Age VIII 

Boys 

Girls .. 
Both ... 



Age IX 
Boys . . 
Girls.. 
Both. 

Age X 
Boys.. 

Age XI 
Boys. . 



Table IX shows what an enormous variation there is in spelling ability between 
pupils of the same or different B.-S. ages. While one pupil in the IV-year classifi- 
cation (shown in Table II) spelled all the 20 words, one X-year old spelled only two 
words and another only eight. The Vll-year olds spell all the way from 5 words to 
20 words. There is extensive overlapping in most of the ages in which there are 
enough subjects to justify comparison. 



32 



Miami University 



TABLE X 

DISTRIBUTION OF SPELLING SCORES IN AGE VI OF STARCH'S SCALE 

LIST I LIST II 



Boys 


Girls 


No. Pupils 


No. Words 


No. Pupfls 


No. Words 


2 

4 

2 



1 

1 

4 

5 

6 

7 

10 

15 

18 

21 

36 

43 


1 

1 
2 
1 
2 

1 
1 
2 

1 
1 




1 
2 


1 

2 


5 
10 


4 

1 

2 .. 

2.... . .... 

1 


11 

16 
18 
26 
29 


1 ., 




1 

1 






1 








' 




25 




13 











Boys 


Girls 


No. Pupils 


No. Words 


No. Pupils 


No. Words 


4 


1 
2 
4 
5 
7 
8 
9 
10 
11 
12 
15 
16 
19 
25 
33 
35 


1 
1 
1 
3 
1 
1 
1 
1 
2 
1 


1 


2.... 


2 


1 


4 


2 

3 


5 
13 


2 

1 

1 


16 

18 
20 


3 .. 


22 


1 


30 


1 




1 






1 ... 






1 

1 

1 












26 




13 











In Table X, which gives the distribution for the Starch lists in B.-S. age VI, the 
boys vary in column I from no words spelled correctly to 43 spelled correctly, and the 
girls from no words to 29, while in column II the boys vary from 1 to 35 words and 
the girls from 1 to 30. In these lists many V-year olds spell just as well as many 
Vlll-year olds. 

TABLE XI 
THE Q AND R (RANGE) FOR THE AYRES SCALE ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



Sex 



Q R 



Q R 



Q R 



Q R 



Q R 



Q R 



Q R 



Age IV 
Boys 
Girls . 



Age V 
Boys ■ ■ 
Girls .. 
Both... 



Age VI 
Boys ■ . 
Girls . . 
Both . . 



Age VII 
Boys ■ - 
Girls ■ 
Both.... 

Age VIII 
Boys . . 
Girls . . 
Both ... 

Age IX 
Boys . . . 
Girls . . 
Both.... 



3-4 



4-7 



2.5 

1.75 

2 



1-7 



4.75 

5. 

4.5 



1.75 
15 



2-14 



1-16 
1-15 
1-16 



0-16 
1-17 
0-17 



1-17 

12-15 

1-17 



11-16 
13-15 
11-16 



6.5 
3. 

6.25 



4.75 

2.5 

4.5 



0-14 



0-15 
1-15 
0-15 



0-18 
0-18 
0-18 



0-17 
4-15 
0-17 



9-18 
12-17 
9-13 



3.75 
2 25 
35 



19-20 
10-16 
10-20 



2-20 
13-20 
2-20 



6-20 
5-20 
5-20 



9-20 
6-20 
6-20 



12-20 
12-20 



2.5 



6 25 

4 

6 



3. 
2.75 



11-16 
8-14 
8-16 



1-19 
5-20 
1-20 



2-17 
1-20 
1-20 



3-20 
2-19 
2-20 



4-19 
4-19 



8.5 



5.75 

2 

5 



3.75 
2 25 
2.5 



3 

2 75 
3 



2. 
3.25 



13-19 
1-2 
1-19 



0-18 

1-6 

0-18 



0-11 
0-12 
0-12 



1-20 
1-16 
1-20 



4-8 
4-11 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



33 



Table XI gives in detail the range of scores (R) and the quartile deviation (Q) in 
each B.-S. age for the Ayres columns. Confining our analysis to the results for both 
sexes combined for the five most difficult lists, we find that in column E, which contains 
17 words the largest range is from 0-17, or 17 words, in age VI, and the smallest from 
11-16, or 5 words in age VIII. The smallest Q is 1.5 words in age VIII, and the largest 
5.25 in age IV. In age VIII the Q amounts to 9% of the number of words attempted, 
while in age IV it amounts to 30%. 

In column F, which contains 18 words, the greatest range is 18 words, in age VI 
and the smallest 9 words, in age VIII. The Q varies from 6.25 words in age V, or 34% 
of the number attempted, to 4 words, or 22%, in age VIII. 

In column I the greatest range is 18 words, in age VI, and the smallest 8, in age 
IX, while the largest Q is 3.5 words, or 17% of the 20 words attempted, in ages VI and 
VII, and the smallest 1 or 5% in age IX. 

In column L, the greatest rsnge is 19 words, in VI and VII, and the smallest 8, in 
age V, while the largest Q is 6, or 30% of the 20 words attempted, in age VI, and the 
smallest 2.5, or 12%, in age V. 

In column O the greatest range is 19 words, in age VIII, and the smallest 7 words 
in age IX, while the largest Q is 8.5 words, or 42% of the 20 words attempted, in age 
V, and the smallest 2.5, or 12%, in age VII. While the variation is usually very 
considerable with the common Ayres words, it is even greater with the chance Starch 
words. 



TABLE XII 
THE Q AND R (RANGE) FOR THE STARCH SCALE ACCORDING TO THE B.-S. AGE 



Sex 



A-ge III 
Boys.. 

Age IV 
Boys.. 
Girls- . 
Both 

Age V 
Boys. . 
Girls. 
Both . . 



Age VI 
Boys. . 
Girls.. 
Both . . 



List I 



4. 

75 

7. 



0-3 



1-4 
1-2 

1-4 



2-11 
0-16 
0-16 



0-43 
0-29 
0-43 



List II 



4.5 
8 25 
7. 



3-7 



5-11 

2-5 

2-11 



0-14 
1-16 
0-16 



1-35 
1-30 

]--(5 



Sex 


List I 


List n 


Q 


R 


Q 


R 


Age VII 
Boys 


5.25 
7.75 
4.5 

6. 25 
6.75 
7.5 

9. 


1-29 
5-46 
1-46 

4-55 
3-45 
3-55 

20-39 
22-30 
20-39 

5-12 


6. 
575 

5.5 

9.25 
7.25 

7. 

6. 


20-31 


Girls 


6-37 
0-37 

5-46 
10-51 
5-51 

20-37 
23-29 


Both 

Age VIII 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 

Age IX 

Boys 

Girls 


Both 




20-37 


Age X 
Boys 




8-19 



Based on the averages for the two sexes the greatest range in list I, Table XII, is 
52 words, in age VIII, and the smallest three words, in ages III and IV; while the largest 
Q is 7.5 words, in age VIII, and the smallest .5 in age III. In list II the greatest 
range is 46 words, in age VIII, and the smallest 4 words, in age III, while the largest 
Q is 7, in ages VI and VIII, and the smallest 2, in age III. The small variations in ages 
III and IV are due, of course, to the inability of these pupils of low mentality to spell 
many words. We cannot accurately express the Q's in terms of per cents of the 
number of words given, for the number of words given varied with the grade, and the 
B.-S. ag^s and the grade tabulation, of course, do not correspond. 



34 Miami University 

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS 

1 The improvement in spelling efficiency in the AyresHsts with increasing grade, 
increasing Binet-Simon age and increasing intelligence classification is not 
very marked nor is it always consistent. The irregularities and exceptions in 
the curve of improvement are due to a number of factors: the selection of the 
best spellers among the low grade pupils, the restriction of the testing of many 
pupils to only a few columns, some pupils not being given enough of the harder 
columns and some not enough of the easier; the difference in the chronological 
age, and the amount of time spent in school by the children in the different 
groups; the presence of especially v/eak or especially strong spellers in unequal 
proportions in the different groupings; and the limited number of pupils in 
some classification. It is also possible that there may be inaccuracies in the 
grade classification, as the grouping was based on the teacher's classification 
of the pupils in reading. However, the improvement from grade to grade was 
greater for the subnormal than for the normals in some columns, but less in 
others. Thus in column I, using the percentage figures, the subnormals made 
no improvement from second to third grade, while the normals in Ayres 
tabulation increased 20%. The subnormals did 4% better in grade IV than 
they did in grade III, while the normals did 9% better. On the other hand, in 
Hst L, the subnormals did only 10% better in grade III than they did in grade 
II, as compared with 46% for the normals. In grade IV, however, the sub- 
normals did 55% better than in grade III, while the corresponding figure for 
the normals is 25 fr. In making these comparisons it should be remembered 
that the absolute scores of the subnormals were frequently considerably lower 
than the scores for the normals in the corresponding grades. 

2 The improvement with increasing grade, Binet-Simon age and diagnosis is 
more emphatic and more consistent in the Starch lists, although here, too, 
m.any of the disturbing factors enumerated above are also operative. In 
these lists the improvement from grade to grade is about as large for the 
subnormals as for the normals, amounting for the former to 163%, 44%, and 
27% for grades I to IV, and for the latter to 200%, 33 fr, and 27%. 

3 The rating of the relative spelling proficiency of these pupils in terms of 
normal standards differs in the Ayres and Starch lists, while the variation in 
the rating by the different Ayres lists is surprisingly great. The rating by the 
Starch lists, however, corresponds more nearly with the achievement of these 
pupils in the Gray oral reading test and in the special arithmetic exercises. 

The Ayres lists do not afford a very satisfactory instrument for rating 
mental defectives or pupils in the lowest grades in spelling, both because of 
the lack of standards in the lower grades and the lack of standards for 
scores falling below 50%, and because of the great difference in rating 
obtained from the different columns of words. 

4 Our highest group of the feeble-minded, the morons, did not, on the average, 
do better than second grade work in Ayres' lists nor above grade one and a 
half in Starch's lists, after having averaged about six years in school. In 
other words, our highest grade of mental defectives required about 3 years to 
do one year of work. Of our best individual spellers among the mental defec- 
tives only one did better than grade III in Ayres list O and only one did third 
grade work in one of Starch's lists. 

The practical bearing of our conclusion of interest to school administrators 
is that very few children doing work above the second grade in spelling 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 35 

should be assigned to special classes for the feeble-minded. Children in such 
classes doing work above the second grade should be very carefully examined 
to determine whether they are feeble-minded. If they are not they should 
be transferred to properly organized ungraded classes if such classes are 
available. 

It should be remembered that the conclusions set forth in this and the two 
following chapters with respect to the possible educational attainments of 
feeble-minded children are based on the results obtained in a school system 
in which the vast majority of these children withdrew from school on becom- 
ing fourteen years of age. The level of educational attainment in the literary 
branches would probably have been somewhat higher had the children been 
retained two or three years longer. 

The question naturally arises whether society is justified to spend so much 
time, money and effort on a form of instruction which yields such meagre 
results. It may be asked whether it would not be wiser to devote the time 
expended on spelling to forms of training which produce higher returns. We 
may say at once that the effort spent in teaching spelling to the lower grades 
of imbeciles is wasted, and possibly the same conclusion is justified with 
respect to the highest grades of imbeciles. However, it would not be advis- 
able to give no instruction in spelling to the higher grades of young imbeciles, 
because the degree of possible mental development cannot always be accu- 
rately foretold in the early life time of mental defectives. Many who at the 
time of the examination test as imbeciles of the higher grades will eventually 
reach the status of morons. 

So far as concerns the morons, it would not be feasible nor wise to eliminate 
all instruction in spelling. In the first place, most parents would demand 
that the child be given this instruction, and if it were not given in the special 
school they would insist on the transfer of the child to a regular grade. In 
the second place, these children eventually gain a slight degree of mastery of 
a tool which enables them to read simple subject-matter, and to express them- 
selves to some extent in writing. This achievement, however modest, enables 
the individual to escape the stigma of complete illiteracy, and gives him partial 
control of a process which will give him some pleasure and will be of some 
service to him in his after career. Society will probably be willing to bear the 
burden of the expense, if a slight mastery of spelling makes the mental defec- 
tive a little bit more contented, human, and efficient. It is evident, however, 
that too much time should not be devoted to making the mental defective pro- 
ficient in a form of social accomplishment in which he can never become pro- 
ficient, especially when this is done at the sacrifice of more profitable forms 
of training. 

The variability in spelling ability among mental defectives is very considerable. 
We are unable to say from data so far published whether variability is greater 
among mental defectives than among normals. Even if the data were avail- 
able for normals, the results would be more or less equivocal, because fre- 
quently the classes of "normal" children contain mentally retarded children, 
some of whom may be actually feeble-minded. 

The distribution of spelling ability doubtless in general follows the bell-shaped 
curve, among mental defectives and among subnormal as well as among 
normal children. While the mental defectives and subnormals occupy the 
lower end of the curve, the form of the curve of distribution of spelling abili- 
ties within this segment is probably the same as the form of the curve in the 



36 Miami University 

higher segment for normal children. We have found mental defectives, just 
as we have found normal children, who have special ability in spelling, while 
others have special disabilities in spelling, but not one of the subnormals tested 
was a spelling prodigy. Although these variations may often be regarded as 
"natural variations," it is evident that spelling ability depends upon many fac- 
tors,* and that the reasons for the variations may differ in different cases. 

8 Some of our cases of "chronically" poor spelling were due to alexia or 
dyslexia. It is important always to determine whether this factor is operative 
when studying poor spellers, because these cases, so far as we now know, 
constitute the most refractory type of spelling disability. Doubtless many poor 
spellers among children of normal intelligence are unrecognized cases of 
dyslexia. 

9 There is doubtless in general a fair degree of correlation between spelling 
ability and general intelligence, but this correlation is not sufficiently close to 
make it possible to make any definite prediction in regard to an individual's 
spelling ability, even when his intelligence status and his scholastic advantages 
are known. Two of our most intelligent pupils were among our poorest spellers. 
In their cases the special spelling disability was due to dyslexia. Doubtless 
other factors will explain special spelling variations among children of the 
same intelligence level (and stage of instruction). 

There are many who at present believe that children should be classified 
according to their intelligence age as determined by a measuring scale of 
intelligence. Much may be said in favor of this proposal for children without 
special abilities or disabihties. But when children have special defects or 
talents we cannot rigidly adhere to such a scheme of classificiation. 
10 There is no clear difference in our results between the spelling ability of 
boys and girls among subnormals. Possibly the girls may be slightly superior. 
Satisfactorily to evaluate our results it would be necessary to compare the 
intelligence and chronological ages of, and the amount of time spent in school 
by, the boys and girls in corresponding classifications. These data are available 
in the tables, with the exception of the intelligence ages (the grouping, however, 
in some of the tables is based on the intelligence age). So far as concerns 
the averages for the entire group of boys and girls, the average chronological 
ages are practically the samxe in Tables I and II for the boys and girls, while 
the boys had been in school slightly longer. In Table V the girls average 
slightly older, while the time spent in school was the same. The conditions in 
regard to age and amount of schooling are almost the same for the two sexes. 
•The most recent analysis has been made by Hollingworth, as above. 



CHAPTER II 



THE ACHIEVEMENT OF SUBNORMAL PUPILS 
IN THE GRAY ORAL READING TEST 

All the pupils were tested alone in quiet rooms in the regular special school 
buildings by Miss Alice Lachmund, in the interim between April 17 and May 8, 1918. 
The timing was done by means of a stop-watch, and the records were scored in 
accordance with the instructions contained on the reverse side of the record blank. 
However, the instruction under 2.b, "to enter the total score for each paragraph in the 
column under 'Score' is applied to 3., finding the individual scores, and should be 
corrected in the future editions. The grade classification of the pupils in reading was 
made by the pupils' classroom teachers. 

Of the 304 pupils given Gray's test, 161 had been tested by the old B.-S. scale and 
75 by the Stanford. The 65 who had not been tested had been admitted to the special 
schools before the clinic was establised. The number of pupils enrolled on April 26 
was 380, so that approximately 75 pupils were not given the reading test. Some of these 
pupils were absent, but many were not tested because the classroom teachers reported 
that they were incapable of reading. Of 28 who were present and who had been 
examined in the clinic, but who vv^ere not given the test because they could not read, 21 
had been classified as imbeciles, 2 as potential morons, 1 as moron, 2 as borderhne 
and 2 as "deferred." However, a considerably larger proportion of the pupils present 
were tested in reading than in spelling or arithmetic, obviously because more atten- 
tion has been given to the teaching of reading to these children than to the teaching 
of either number or spelling. Reading is the most important of the literary branches 
taught not only in the special schools but also in the elementary schools. 

THE RELATION OF ACHIEVEMENT IN READING TO ASCENDING 
SCHOOL GRADE, B.-S. AGS, AND DIAGNOSIS 

The analyses will be restricted to the averages for the two sexes, including the 
medians in the tabulation according to B.-S. age. 

Only three pupils classified as of kindergarten grade, Table XIII, were given the 
reading test, all failing to make any score. Two of these pupils had been examined in 
the clinic. 



37 



38 



Miami University 



TABLE XIII 
ORAL READING TEST ACCORDING TO GRADE 



Sex 



;No. 



Chron. Age 
at Time of 



B.-S. 
Test 



Read. 
Test 



B.-S. 
Age 



Yrs. in 
School 



Score 



Number 

and 
Average 



Kindergarten 

Boys 

Boys 



Grade I 
Boys.. 
Boys.. 
Girls. . 
Girls. . 
Both.. 
Both. . 



Grade II 
Boys... 
Boys... 
Girls... 
Girls... 
Both... 
Both... 



Grade III 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls.... 

Girls 

Both.... 
Both.... 



Grade IV 
Boys — 
Boys - . 
Girls ... 
Girls... 
Both.... 
Both.... 



General Averages for all Grades 

Boys 

Boys 

Girls 

Girls 

Both 

Both 



2 
8.5 



101 

10.09 

43 

10.04 
144 

10.08 



37 

11.31 
22 

11 73 
59 
11 47 



18 

12.44 
9 

12.08 
27 
12.32 



3 
13.42 

1 
13. 25 

4 
13.37 



207,161 
.... 10. 68 

97 75 
. . . . 10 82 
304 236 
. . . . I 10 73 



3 

10.91 



116 

11.43 

47 

11.61 
163 

11.48 



55 

13. 04 
32 

13 03 
87 
13-04 



29 

13.81 

17 

14.33 

46 

14 



3 

14.69 

1 
14. 66 

4 
14.68 



206 

12.23 

97 

12 58 
303 

12 35 



2 
5.7 



102 
6.5 
43 
6.23 

145 
6 42 



36 

8.17 
22 

7.37 
58 

7.87 



18 

84 

9 

7.86 
27 

8.22 



3 

10.03 
1 
8.66 

4 
9.69 



161 

7.14 
75 

6.79 
236 

7.03 



2 
3.45 



99 

4.4 
43 

4 23 
142 

4.35 



36 

6.36 
22 

6 33 
58 

6. 35 



18 

6. 74 

9 

5.21 
27 

6 23 



3 

7 01 

1 

7.66 

4 

7.17 



158 

5.15 
75 

5.01 
233 

5.11 



5.51 
'7'76" 



31 08 
"35 .'44' 



32.69 



40.12 



40.36 
40.21 



47.91 
'42 '5'" 



46 56 



17.69 
22!96' 
"19.37 



. Number 
Average 



. Number 
• Average 
. Number 
. Average 
. Number 
. Average 



..Number 
. Average 
..Number 
. Average 
. Number 
.Average 



..Number 
. Average 
..Number 
. Average 
..Number 
.Average 



. Number 
. Average 
. Number 
. Average 
. Number 
. Average 



. Number 
.Average 
. Number 
.Average 
. Number 
.Average 



For explanation of tables see Table I. 

Case Twenty was first examined in the clinic January, 1915, age 7.3, having been 
one year in the kindergarten and one quarter in the first grade. The school reported 
that he had not shown any special interests or capacities, that he had made no progress 
"compared with children a year younger," that he was excellent in conduct, and that 
he had one brother and one sister, aged 8 and 10, both in school and both poor in their 
school work. The developmental history indicated that he was the third child, born 
of American parents, age 23 (mother) and 28 years at the time, that his birth was one 
month premature, that he was delivered with instruments, after a very difficult labor, 
that he was yellowish at birth and weighed six pounds but that he was healthy as a 
baby, and that he had measles at two years, from which, however, he recovered 
completely. He showed no developmental retardations. He cut his first tooth and sat 
at 6 months, stood at 9 months, took his first steps unsupported at 11 months, and 
expressed himself in short phrases at 9? months (the mother was not very certain 
about the accuracy of the latter statement). He talked and walked earlier than his 
sister. He was a "quiet, good boy," although he had always been "nervous." No 
significant facts were obtained from the family history. The physical examination 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 39 

only revealed the presence of dental caries and a bulging forehead. By the 1908 scale 
he was backward 1.5 years and by the 1911, 1.7 years (I. Q. .75), while by the Seguin 
form board he was backward 1.8 years by the combined norms and over 3 years by 
the writer's norms. He was able to read a few monosyllables by sight. His head 
girth was not quite equal to a 6-year old boy (20.3 inches), and in standing and sitting 
height, weight and dynamometry with the right and left hand he fell, respectively, in 
the fifteenth, fifth, tenth, thirteenth and tenth percentiles for his age. He manifested a 
distinct lisp in speech, involving particularly the articulation of ch, th, sonant and surd 
(the latter being correctly pronounced in some words), v, y, z, and g in certain 
combinations. The diagnosis was deferred, and the recommendation was made that 
he be given special articulation drills, that he be transferred to an ungraded class for 
special aid in the regular school work and for careful observation, and that he be 
re-examined later if he failed to make adequate progress. The school found it possible 
to carry out the recommendations only in part (no ungraded class was available) and 
he was referred for another examination in January, 1917, aged 9.3. He had been 
advanced to the first grade third quarter after three and a half years in school, but 
was said to do satisfactory work in "no grade or quarter." His greatest deficiency 
was in reading, his greatest interest in cutting, drawing and coloring, but he did not 
show any talent in anything. He was reported good in moral characteristics, excellent 
in disposition and conduct, but "extremely backward." His brother, now age 12, had 
advanced to IV^, and his sister, now aged 10, to IIP. He was now retarded 2.9 by the 
1908 and 3.1 by the 1911 (I. Q. .66), and 2.8 by the Seguin form board according to the 
combined norms and over 3 years according to the writer's norms. He was unable to 
read the monosyllables in the B.-S. selection, but could read, although poorly, the 
material in a primer which he had gone over many times. On the physical side the 
only defects reported were a number of very bad dental roots. His greatest obvious 
improvement was in articulation. He spoke much more distinctly than when he was 
examined two years before. He was diagnosed as an imbecile and assigned to a 
special school. But the parents protested that he was not mentally deficient and 
therefore refused to give consent to the transfer. In November, 1917, he was again 
reported to the clinic, having been demoted to P after over four years in school. The 
transfer to the special school was finally effected on the twenty-fifth of the month, 
with instruction to give the child "a preponderance of sensory, motor, and physical 
training, the rudiments of the literary branches on a sensory basis, and articulation 
drills to correct phonetic defects." At the close of the school year, at the age of over 
ten and a half years and after about five years in school, he was reported as doing 
good work in physical and sense training games, calisthenics, corrective physical 
exercises, and knitting, and very good work in clay. He did about P in reading easy 
sentences from the blackboard, and in spelling words from the day's lesson, less than 
P in counting and copying figures in arithmetic, and poor work in oral and written 
language. In oral expression he "has so little voice it is difficult to judge." "He does 
not care to talk." His greatest capacity is in handwork, and his greatest improvement 
in reading. He applies himself and is obedient and cheerful. He was not given the 
Ayres and Starch spelling tests, or the spiral arithmetic exercises. 

After five years in school this boy cannot do the literary work as well as a norma 1 
child who has been in the first grade less than a year. Certainly from the standpoint 
of the results the state would be justified in excluding this type of a child, after a fair 
trial, from attendance in the day schools, or at least largely limit his instuction to sim- 
ple practical forms of motor and industrial training, and the development of habits of 
self -care and helpfulness to others. But the parents insist not only that he is entitled 



40 Miami University 

to public school instruction because they are taxpayers, but also that he must be given 
adequate drill in the literary branches. The educational treatment of pupils of this 
type' presents a social problem which is not easilj^ solved. 

Case Twenty-one was examined in the clinic in September, 1916, at age 7.7, having 
been half a year each in the kindergarten and first grade. He was reported as being 
"listless and stupid, caring for nothing, and showing no ability." He was said to have 
had convulsions when quite 5^oung. He measured 2.1 years short in general intelligence 
by the 1908 scale, and 2.5 years by the 1911 scale (I. Q. .67) and 3 years short by the 
Seguin form board. He was illiterate and subject to a slight lisp, while his facial 
appearance was distinctly adenoidal. He was assigned to a special school as a moron 
(or rather potential moron). The first report a month later from the special school 
indicated that he was "doing nicely" but the second report, at the end of the year, stated 
that he was "very defective." After two years in the special school, at the age of 
9 years and 5 months, the report indicated that he was fair in modeling simple objects 
in clay, poor in raffia weaving, drawing, writing, arithmetic and reading, doing about 
P work in each. His progress, however, was said to have been "greatly retarded 
by long periods of absence." "He does fairly well when his attendance is regular." He 
was not given the Ayres or Starch spelling tests or the spiral arithmetic exercises, 
because the teacher reported that he could do nothing in them. It is evident that this 
boy has m.ade very slow progress, and that he will prove to be more defective than it 
at first appeared. 

The increase in the "raw" scores from grade to grade. Table XIII, is marked, amount- 
ing to 6.15 points from the kindergarten to the first grade, 26.54 points from grade I 
to grade II, 7.52 points from grade II to III, and 6.35 points from grade III to IV. 
Paralleling this increase in achievement we find that the chronological age, the B.-S. 
^ge and the amount of time spent in school increase from grade to grade, except that 
the third grade pupils had on the average spent slightly less time in school than the 
second grade pupils. The greatest difference in the amount of time spent in school is 
between grades I and II, am.ounting to two years, while the greatest difference in B.-S. 
age is between grades I and II and III and IV, amounting, respectively, to 1.45 and 1.47 
of a year. The unusually large increase in the reading score between grades I and II 
is probably not due solely to the considerable difference in the intelligence level of the 
pupils in these grades, but to the probability that some pupils classified in the first 
grade should, instead, have been classified in the kindergarten, or in sub-first. This is 
suggested by the fact that, although the percentage of gain made from grade to grade 
is decidedly greater among the pupils in the special schools than among the pupils in 
the regular grades in St. Louis, the comparative increase from grade I to grade II is 
preternaturally large among the special pupils. This is shown by the following indices 
of improvement which were obtained by dividing the score made by the special school 
pupils in grade I into the score made in grade II, in grade II into grade III, and in 
grade III into grade IV, while the indices for the pupils in the regular grades were 
similarly secured by using the scores made in the regular grades:* 



Grades 


II 


III 


IV 


I 


II 


III 


Special Classes . . 


5 30 
123 


1.23 

1.06 


1 15 


Regular Classes 


1.04 



*These indices are based upon the raw scores. If the basis of scoring for the first paragraph had 
been the same for all grades, the improvement would have been larger in both groups. We shall again 
refer to the system of preferential weighting used in scoring the records. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 41 

The improvement in grades III and IV among the special school pupils is insignifi- 
cant compared with the improvement of 430% in grade II compared with grade I. 
The fact that the relative gain from grade to grade is considerably greater throughout 
for the pupils in the special schools than for those in the regular grades caused us 
some surprise, in view of the fact that the chronological age and the amount of time 
spent in school by the special class pupils increases less than a year except for grade 
II, while the average mental age increases over a year only in grades II and IV, the 
latter of which shows the smallest gain. It is probable that the greater percentage of 
gain made by the subnormal group is due to their very low scores in the lower grades, 
which makes it possible for them to improve relatively more from grade to grade than 
the normal pupils. We have already called attention to the fact that because of their 
low initial scores feeble-minded children improve relatively more from practice in 
replacing the blocks in the Seguin form board than do normal children. In a number 
of group tests of intelligence we likewise found that epileptics also improved relatively 
more than normal pupils from repetitions of the same tests.* We must, of course 
bear in mind that our group of subnormals and mental defectives average considerably 
higher in chronological age than the normal pupils with whom we are comparing 
them. 

Turning to the results for the B.-S. ages. Table XIV, all of the six pupils in Age 
III failed completely in the test, although they had been in school on the average over 
three years and averaged ten years of age, and although the B.-S. age assigned them 
did not do them full justice owing to linguistic or other special handicaps. Five of 
these cases had been diagnosed as imbeciles while the diagnosis was deferred in the 
other case. 



*Psycho-Motor Norms for Practical Diagnosis, 1916, pp. 73-88. 

Problems of Subnormality, 1917, p. 378 (we here give, however, only the absolute improvement 
which is smaller in most tests for the epileptics while the relative improvement is larger). 

The Measurement of Mental Traits in Normal and Epileptic School Children (the publication of 
this manuscript has been delayed because of the present difficulties of publication). 



42 



Miami University 



TABLE XIV 
ORAL READING TEST ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



Sex 



No. 



Chron. Age at 
Time of 



B.-S. Read. 
Test Test 



B.-S. 
Age 



! Yrs. in 
1 School 



Score 



Age III 
Boys 

Age IV 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 

AgeV 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 

Age VI 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 

Age VII 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 

Age VIII 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 

Age IX 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 

AgeX 
Boys 

Age XI 
Boys 

General Averages for all Ages 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 



46 
23 
69 



160 

75 

235 



8.61 


10.55 


3.54 


3.06 


9 19 

9.4 

9.32 


10.85 
11 66 
11 36 


4.4 

4.35 

4.37 


3.95 
3.81 
3 86 


8.85 
8.21 
8.63 


10.28 
9.21 
9.91 


5 42 
5.6 

5.48 


3 52 
3.2 
3. 41 


9.65 
9.71 
9.67 


10 90 
11.47 
11.09 


6.45 
6.32 
6. 41 


4.07* 

4.33 

4.16t 


11.19 
12.47 
11.62 


12.34 
13 69 
12.79 


7.4 

7.41 

7.4 


5.66t 
5 94 
5.76« 


12.03 
12.17 
12 07 


13.47 
13.44 
13.46 


8 37 
8 33 
8.36 


6 5611 
6. 22 
6.46»* 


12.19 
11.16 
12.08 


13 98 

13 

13.88 


9.27 
9 
9. 15 


6. 91 
5.5 
6.77 


13.4 


14.16 


10.2 


7 9 


14.6 


14.75 


11 


6 5 


10.68 
10.82 
10.73 


12 

12 28 
12.09 


7.09 
6.79 
7 00 


5 15 
5.22 
5 17 



2 32 

1 47 



2. 13 
'l'39" 



11.16 
11 72 
11.34 



11 82 
26.08 
16. 57 



29. 48 
32.85 
30.46 



28.33 
51. 25 
30 62 



37.50 



33 75 



14.85 
18.31 
15.96 



Ten of the IV-year olds also completely failed in the test, six having been diag- 
nosed as imbeciles, one as potential feeble-minded and three as "deferred," while only 
one pupil, case Twenty-two, scored in the test, 16.25 points (from the first grade base), 
which is less than one-half of the St. Louis P standard (38). She was not given the 
spelling and arithmetic tests. This girl, a Mongolian imbecile, aged thirteen and a 
half years, who had been seven and a half years in school, who at the age of 11 years 
(in July, 1915) was 6.4 years backward by the 1908 and 6.8 years backward by the 
1911 (I. Q. .38), who was 5.5 years backward by the Seguin form board according to 
the combined norms and a little over six according to the writer's norms, and whose 
best times in the writer's peg boardstt were 12.4 seconds in series A, 15 seconds in C 
and 22 seconds in D. 

In physical development she occupied the eighth and fifteenth percentiles in standing 
and sitting height, the fifth percentile in weight, and the zero percentile in right and 
left grip, while her head girth was about equal to that of a three-year old child (19.1 in- 
ches), with a cephalic index of 82.7 (antero-posterior diameter 162 mm. and transverse 

•Based 41 cases, t 62 cases, t 44 cases. ^ 67 cases. II 33 cases. ♦• 47 cases. 
ttThe Peg Form Boards. The Psychological Clinic, 1918, pp. 40-53. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



43 



diameter 134 mm.). Her lobules were lacking, her lips were thick, the lower one 
everted, her uvula very long, forehead somewhat bulging, fingers and tongue mongo- 
loid, gait shuffling, speech inarticulate, shoulders stooped and asymmetrical, neuro- 
muscular tone deficient, expression imbecilic, her teeth only partially developed, and 
palate narrow and low, but fiat in the dome. A year later her percentiles were just the 
same in physical development, while she had gained almost a year in the Seguin form 
board test. The mother fell down the stairway during the third month of pregnancy, 
and was very weak at the time of labor, which was long and difficult. The mother 
was 28 years of age and the father 54 at the time of the girl's birth. An only sibling, 
an older brother, is paralyzed from infantile paralysis. The girl did not stand alone 
until three, or walk until four. Only scarlet fever at six years of age is reported in 
her record of diseases. She is obedient in the home. At the time of the first clinic 
examination she was able to read a little from a primer in use in the first grade. 

We have received four annual reports of the work of this pupil in a special school, 
but space permits only a brief summary. After over five years in the special school 
and over two years in the regular school, she was reported as doing second grade 
reading, and P spelling. She responds very slowly and only when forced to do so in 
physical, sense-training and mental games. She is slow in following directions. She is 
poor in clay work, can knit a little under constant supervision, she is neat and 
painstaking in buck toweling, she is poor in writing, she reads familiar material well, 
but has great difficulty in making out new words, her oral expression is very faulty, 
she prattles constantly when playing but otherwise does not care to talk, she counts 
but has little conception of number, her greatest improvement has been in reading, 
she is obedient, willing, and tries, but is phlegmatic, tires easily, and is so timid that 
she seems to be stubborn. 

This child is typical of the lower grades of Mongolian deficients, most of whom 
remain custodial cases for life. It is to be hoped that the public schools may be entire- 
ly relieved of the responsibility of the training of Mongolians of the degree of intel- 
ligence possessed by this girl. After all these years of patient tuition the schools have 
been able to give her very little of economic value. She should have been given 
simple forms of manumental work in some institution. It should be said, however, 
that many Mongolians seem to make more progress in reading than they do in manu- 
mental work. Many are so extremely awkward and clumsy in muscular co-ordination 
that they never acquire any useful degree of motor skill. They can only perform 
tasks which require little intelligence and little manual dexterity. This Mongolian 
pupil, e. g., reads better than many of our non-Mongolians of considerably higher grade 
of intelligence. This girl did not reach our intelligence standard for entrance or reten- 
tion in a special school, but we have permitted her to remain partly because of the 
entreaties of her parents and partly in order to have one of her type and grade of 
intelligence available for study and for observation by students preparing to work 
among mental defectives. 

The curve of improvement in reading with each increasing B.-S. age, Table XIV, 
is quite irregular, as shown by the following indices, representing the quotient obtained 
by dividing the raw reading score of a given B.-S. age into the score of the next 
higher B.-S. age: 





Ages 


V 


VI 


VII 


VIII 


IX 


X 


XI 




IV 


V 


VI 


VII 


VIII 


IX 


X 




.94 


8.15 


1.46 


1.83 


1.005 


1.22 


.90 







44 



Miami University 



The gains vary from .005% in Age IX (compared with age VIII) to 715% in age 
VI (compared with age V), while the losses vary from 6% in age V to 10% in age XI, 
compared in each case with the preceding age. The loss in age V is probably due to 
the fact that the pupils average almost a year and a half younger and had been in 
school almost half a year less than the pupils in age IV. The results for ages X and 
XI are, of course, unreliable because only two pupils are included, and both of them 
of very special type. The X-year old is the dyslexia pupil, case Eleven, discussed in 
the section dealing with the spelling tests. He barely did P work in reading. Although 
he did better than the average in age IX, it must be remembered that most of the 
pupils in age IX were more retarded mentally, six had been diagnosed as borderline 
and four as very backward. The dyslexia case was merely backward. As we pointed 
out before, while he did only about first grade work in the reading and spelling tests 
he did from third to fifth or sixth grade work in the spiral arithmetic exercises. 

The XI -year old boy was also described in the section on spelling (case Two), 
His low reading score was due to spastic paralysis which produced very difficult and 
labored articulation. He required from 39 to 175 seconds to read the different 
paragraphs, which was exceedingly slow for a child of his intelligence. 

The medians, Table XV, are decidedly lower than the averages in ages IV to VII 
and somewhat higher in ages VIII and IX. No comparison is possible in ages X and 
XI. The big difference between the medians and averages in ages VI and VII is due to 
the fact that 39 of the 63 pupils in age VI and 33 of the 69 pupils in age VII made zero 
scores. 

TABLE XV 
MEDIANS IN READING TEST ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



B.-S. Ages 


Ill 


IV 


V 


VI 


VII VIII 


IX 


Boys 

Girls 

Both 


.0 
.0 



.0 
.0 


.0 
.0 
.0 


.0 
.0 
.0 


.0 

31.25 

2.5 


36.25 
33.12 
35.62 


30 

51.25 
33 75 



If we confine the comparison to the imbeciles, morons, borderline and backward, 
in Table XVI, there is a marked increase from classification to classification, v/ith the 
exception of the backward group, as shown by the following indices of improvement 
which have been computed by dividing the raw score in a lower classification into the 
score in the next higher classification: 



Category 


Morons 


Borderline 


Backward 


Imbeciles 


Morons 


Borderline 


Index . . 


4.37 


139 


.87 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



45 



TABLE XVI 
ORAL READING TEST ACCORDING TO DIAGNOSIS 



Sex 




Imbeciles 
Boys — 
Girls ... 
Both ... 



Potential Morons 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 



Morons 
Boys.. 
Girls . 
Both . 



Potential Feeble-Minded 

Boys 

Girls 

Both 



Borderline 

Boys 

Girls.... 
Both . . 



Backward 
Boys 
Girls — 
Both 



Deferred 
Boys . . 
Girls . . 
Both... 



Normal 
Girl 



Chron. Age 
at Time of 



B.-S. 
Test 



9.64 
10.27 
9.91 



10.42 
10.46 
10.43 



11.79 
13.14 
12.28 



9.89 
10.02 
9.93 



10 86 
11.57 
10 97 



10.47 
8.15 
9.87 



9.23 
9 05 
9.16 



8.0 



Read. 
Test 



12.31 
11.99 
12.18 



11.28 
10.13 
10 85 



12.75 
14. 11 
13 24 



10 34 
10.76 
10.47 



12.48 
13.49 
12. 63 



12 91 
10.54 
12 29 



11.22 
10 73 
11.04 



9 75 



B.-S. 
Age 



Yrs. in 
School 



Score 



5. 07 
5.6 
5 29 



5 38 
5 89 
5.57 



7 32 

7.76 
7.48 



6 96» 
6 19 
6.71t 



7.72 
7 98 
7 79 



8. 37 
6.46 

7.87 



6 1 
5. 95 
6 04 



7 8 



3.88 
4.82 
4.19 



36 

3.95 

3.73 



5 82 

5.87 
5. 84 



3 59t 
4.7 
3. 96 



6. 10 
6.38 
6 15 



5 87§ 
3.91 

5.3311 



4. 63 
3.5 
4. 21 



4,75 



.35 
9.5 
4. 16 



4.75 

.41 

3. 12 



13. 83 
25 83 
18.20 



11.25 
21 25 
14.4 



24.17 
34. 82 
25 83 



25.44 
14 16 
22.5 



10.10 
3 39 
7. 78 



2.5 



Emphatically the largest improvement is made by the morons compared with the 
imbeciles, corresponding to the large improvement of the second grade over the first 
grade, and the sixth intelligence age compared with the fifth, although the gains in the 
latter comparisons are much larger. The reason the backward did 13% poorer than 
the borderline may be partly due to the fact that they averaged a third of a year younger 
in chronological age (while grading a trifle higher in B.-S. age).** The main reason 
however, is that the backward group averaged almost a year less in school than the 
borderline. The reason that the potential morons who, in our belief, possessed enough 
intelligence eventually to advance to the highest grade of mental defectives, did poorer 
than the imbeciles is probably due to the fact that they averaged a year and a third 
younger, and had been in school almost a half year less. They averaged higher in B.-S. 
age, however, in fact relatively higher than indicated in the table, because relatively 
more of the potential morons than the imbeciles had been examined by the Stanford 
revision, which grades the subject lower than either the 1908 or 1911. It would seem 
that the potential feeble-minded who, we felt, would eventually prove to be feeble- 
minded, should have done better than the morons in the test. The reason they did 
not do better — they did only about 80% as well as the morons— is probably due to the 
fact that they averaged 2.77 years younger, had been in school 1.88 years less, and 

•Based on 25 cases. t24 cases. t37 cases. ^16 cases. 1123 cases. 

••It is evident that small differences in the intelligence level of different groups cannot be brought 
out by the usual method of giving mental ages in round numbers, instead of fractional parts of a year, 
as we have uniformly done. 



46 Miami University 

measured .77 of a year less in B.-S. age. With respect to the intelHgence age, how- 
ever, it should be said that the potential feeble-minded rated relatively higher than the 
morons as they averaged only 9.93 years of age at the time of the examination, as 
against 12.28 years for the morons, giving an average I. Q. of 67 for the potential feeble- 
minded as compared with 60 for the morons. 

We need not consider the "deferred" cases, because the diagnosis in these cases was 
suspended, frequently because the children were unable to do themselves justice in the 
B.-S. or literary tests on account of linguistic or speech handicaps. Most of these cases 
graded appreciably higher in motor tests. 

The girl diagnosed as normal, case Twenty-three, an only child, was an epileptic 
who graded normal at the time of the examination. At the age of eight she measured 
7.8 years by the 1911 and 8.4 by the 1908, while grading only 7 years by the Seguin 
form board according to the combined norms and 6j4 according to the writer's norms. 
The physical examination was negative save for the epilepsy and a recent attack 
of pneumonia with pleuritic effusion for which she had been operated but from which 
she had not completely recovered. The epileptic convulsions began at six months and 
had continued irregularly, averaging perhaps two or three attacks a week. She was 
somewhat retarded in her early development, cutting her first tooth at nine months 
without any illness, first standing at twelve, walking at 15 months, and using single 
words at twelve and short phrases at fifteen months. She had been in school two and 
a half years, but her attendance had been very irregular. She did best in arithmetic 
and poorest in reading. She was assigned to a special school on the assumption that 
she would stagnate mentally. 

After two years and three months in the special school the record shows that the 
seizures (a mild form of grand mal) have continued, sometimes as frequently as three 
or four times a day, in consequence of which she has been out an average of two 
days a week. The first two reports recorded improvement in reading, while the last 
report (June, 1918) indicated that she had lost ground in reading and spelling, while 
she had improved in arithmetic, advancing from 1-' at the time of entrance to IP (at 
the age of 10 years ) . She did fairly well in basketry, plain band sewing and simple 
and ornamental stitching, and enjoys this work. Her greatest capacities were reported 
in handwork and arithmetic, she is willing but tires easily and is always seeking a 
change of occupation. She is is inclined to be willful and selfish, and her greatest 
fault is "unkindness to playmates." In Gray's oral reading test she scored only 2.5, 
which is decidely belov/ the 1* standard. She spelled all the words in Ayres A to D, 
doing second grade or better, and 82% of the words in E, which is not equal to second 
grade. She had a seizure when column I was given. In the spiral arithmetic exercises 
she did 7 samples in test A, 3 in B, 1 in C, 2 in D, 1 in E and 1 in G. How much 
these scores are below III- standard the inadequate norms make it impossible to 
determine. 

It is of interest to note that the B.-S. VIII-, IX- and Xl-year olds do about as well 
as the special school children classified in the second grade, the X-year old doing 
somewhat better. There are no other correspondences which are even approximate. 
All the other B.-S. age groups do decidedly poorer than the second grade pupils. Our 
imbeciles and potential morons are inferior to our first grade group, while the scores 
in all the other categories in Table XVI are decidely lower than the score for our 
second grade group. 

SEX DIFFERENCES 

The girls surpass the boys in the majority of the classifications. In Table XIII, 
grade classification, they excel in the first three grades and in the general average, 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



47 



while the boys excel in grade IV. The girls did 40% better than the boys in grade I, 
14% better in grade II, only very slightly better in grade III, while the average score 
for all the girls was 29% higher than the boys' general average. Although the girls 
averaged about a third of a year older in chronological age, they averaged about a third 
of a year lower than the boys in intelligence age. In the tabulation according to B.-S. 
age, Table XIV, the girls' scores were higher in five ages and the boys' in one, the 
differences in most ages being small. In the general averages for all the B.-S. ages, 
the girls did 23% better than the boys. The intelligence age was higher in four ages 
for the boys than for the girls and in two ages for the girls, but the differences are 
too small to be of consequence. The boys had been in school longer than the girls in 
five ages, while the girls had been in school longer than the boys in two ages, but here, 
again, the differences are negligible. The boys were older than the girls in 5 ages and 
the girls older than the boys in only one age. Therefore, while the advantages were 
on the side of the boys, the girls excelled in reading. In the diagnosis classification. 
Table XVI, the girls excelled among the imbeciles, morons, potential feeble-minded and 
borderline, and the boys among the potential morons, backward and deferred. Among 
the pupils in the regular grades in St. Louis the girls excelled in every grade except 
the first, the difference amounting approximately to the "progress made in from one- 
fourth to one-third of a year."* 



VARIABILITY 

Our discussion of variability will be restricted to a consideration of the quartile 
deviation (Q) and range (R) for each age in the B.-S. classification and the distribution 
of the scores in age VII, which contains the largest number of pupils. 

As shown in Table XVII there were some pupils in every B.-S. age (except X and 
XI in each of which there was only one pupil), who did not score a single point. The 
number of pupils failing completely has already been given for ages III, IV, VI and VII 
In age V 2 out of 26 made zero scores; in age VIII, 5 out of 48; and in IX, 2 out of 10. 
While the modal number of the VII year olds, 47%, Table XVIII, registered complete 
failures, 11% scored from 45 to 60. It is noticeable that above the zero score there is 
no considerable concentration of scores in any of the 21 groupings among the Vll-year 
olds. 

TABLE XVII 

THE Q AND R FOR THE ORAL READING TEST ACCORDING TO B.-S. AGE 



B.-S. Ages 


Ill 


IV 


V 


VI 


VII 


VIII 


IX 


Q 


R 


Q 


R 


Q 


R 


Q 


R 


Q 


R 


Q 


R 


Q 


R 


Boys 

Girls .... 
Both .... 















0-16.25 
0-16.25 


.47 




0-17. 5 


0-17.5 


7.5 
10.4 
7.9 


0-58.75 
0-56.25 
0-58 75 


11. 87 
19.68 
17. 02 


0-60 

0-52.5 

0-60 


14.37 
13.75 
12.5 


0-52.5 
0-63.75 
0-63 75 


16.56 
25.62 
17 81 


0-57 5 

51 25 
0-57 5 



TABLE XVIII 
DISTRIBUTION OF READING SCORES IN B.-S. AGE VII 





o 


in 


oo 


m 




O 


U5 


O 


■in 

CO 


" 




in 

CO 


in 
od 


LO 
CO 


LO 
[■^ 

CO 


LO 


in 

CQ 

to 


LO 


fe2 


in 


LO 




<S1 


Boys. 

Girls. 


29 
4 
33 


"2 

2 


3 

1 
4 


1 

1 

2 


1 

.... 


"l 

1 


.... 
1 


2 

1 
3 


1 

3 
4 


1 


1 


"2 

2 


2 
"2 


1 

1 

2 


"2 

2 


1 

"i 


1 

"l' 








1 

i' 


1 


1 
1 


2 
2 


1 
1 


Both 


1 


1 


1 



*Gray, as before, p. 139. 



48 Miami University 

The range (R) from the zero scores varied in the different ages from 16.25 in age 
rv to 63.75 in age VIII. The variation in the low B.-S. ages is small, of course, because 
even the best readers did poorly. The Q varies from O, in ages III, IV, and V, which 
contain a preponderance of zero scores, to 17.02 in age VII, which is about the same 
as the average score in this age. The Q's expressed as a percentage of the average 
scores in the corresponding B.-S. ages are 69% in age VI, 102% in age VII, 41% in 
age VIII, and 58% in age IX. It is evident that the variability in reading capacity 
among our mental defectives is enormous, even when they are classified homogeneously 
as to intelligence. Apparently no definite conclusions could be drawn from reading 
capacity regarding the inteUigence level of mental defectives, nor could any inference 
be drawn regarding individuals' reading capacity .from the intelligence level. If we 
divide Gray's "P. E" figures* by 2 (or multiply our Q's by 2) our variability based upon 
the B.-S. classification can be compared with the variability of the pupils in the regular 
schools when classified according to grade. Among the first grade pupils in the St. 
Louis schools the variability is greater than among our Vl-year olds and almost as 
great as among our Vlll-year olds, but considerably less than among our VII- and IX- 
year olds. But the variability in the regular grades above the first is only from one- 
half to one-fifth as large as the variability in our ages from VI to IX. 

The reading ability of many was so poor in relation to their intelligence as almost 
to constitute a specific reading disability. It would be impracticable to attempt to 
analyze all of these poor reading records. Our case analysis will perforce have to be 
restricted to the pupils with the highest intelligence level (IX) who completely failed 
in the reading test. 

Case Twenty -four was a former epileptic who was referred to the clinic at the age 
of 12.5 years, after having been in five different schools in as many years (including 
a rural school and a special class). He had been advanced to IP in school. The 
principal referred him because of "inability to command language sufficient to 
advance." His greatest deficiencies were reported in "language, reading, spelling and 
composition," and his greatest capacity in arithmetic. "He is strong, healthy, quiet, 
orderly and well disposed toward others, but very feeble in grasping ideas. In 
reading he seems to tell his own story instead of pronouncing the words of the book. 
He sits quietly in the seat and tries to do his work. One brother is a painter who 
works regularly and earns $1.25 per day, age 15 (in April, 1917). One brother, age 10, 
is in our third grade and gets on." According to his earlier record in the special 
school he did less than second grade work and was poorest in reading. The develop- 
mental history indicated that he was born on time, weighing 12 pounds, that he began 
to have spasms at 6 months, and that they continued intermittently, coming on with 
a high fever, until the age of seven years. He foamed at the mouth and lost con- 
sciousness during the seizures. At 10 months he had a "double dose of malaria fever," 
and subsequently whooping cough, chicken pox and measles. He cut his first tooth 
at 9 months, sat at 6, stood at 12, took his first steps at 18 and used single words at 
two years. He was the second of three boys, an unwelcome child, born when the 
mother was 23 and the father 27. "The father formerly had some disease about 
which the mother is reticent." The mother said that her husband could not read a 
word and did not know a single letter at the time of his marriage, but he now reads 
and writes a little. He was born in St. Louis, probably received some schooling, she 
thinks, and is now a laborer in "comfortable financial conditions." The boy's physical 
examination was negative save for a "drowsy" expression, outstanding ears, high 
palatal arch, and stoop shoulders. By the 1908 scale he was retarded 2.5 years from 

•As before, p. 130. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 49 

the upper base and 3.3 years from the lower base, and by the 1911 scale three and a 
half years (I. Q. .72). By the Seguin form board he was retarded only half a year by 
the combined norms and one year by the writer's norms. His reading of the Binet 
selection* was very halting and imperfect. With much aid he required a minute and 
a half to read to "dollars" (30 words). His reproduction was: "three homes there in 
winter and summer, 1000 dresses;" which is quite at variance with the text. His 
auditory memory span was limited, as determined by the digit test. He failed to 
reproduce 6 digits. His percentiles in standing and sitting height, weight, and right 
and left grip were 100, 100, 95, 85 and 70. In other words, he was above average in 
physical development. A diagnosis of borderline intelligence, with dyslexia as a possi- 
ble complication, was made, both conditions probably being due to general and focal 
cerebral trauma from the epileptic attacks, and he was reassigned to a special school. 

According to the report from the special school in June, 1917, he was reported as 
doing about IP throughout. He left school in April of the following year, hence we 
have no report for 1918. In the Starch spelling test his rating was about grade one 
and a half in column I and almost grade III in column II. In Ayres I he did somewhat 
better than third grade, in L about fifth grade, and in O one-half of the third grade 
score. This record is rather remarkable in view of the fact that he scored zero in 
reading. 

Case Twenty-five was first referred for examination in February, 1916, when 9.9 
years old. He had been in school over 3 years and had been advanced to the second 
grade second quarter. He was reported weakest in reading, spelling and number work, 
and best in writing, although showing the greatest interest in drawing. The develop- 
mental history v/as not very favorable. He was born on time but cyanotic after a 
difficult labor of 10 hours, weight 12 pounds; had measles at 2, and whooping cough 
and chicken pox at 3; he was run over at one time by an ice wagon, and received an 
injury to the head which did not produce loss of consciousness, while he fell off a 
street car later at the age of seven, remaining unconscious for several hours. The 
mother, however, said she never noticed that he was slow, nor did she notice any 
mental changes after the accidents. She had regarded him as quick and bright, but 
he had been hot tempered, mischievous and subject to night terrors. He was reported 
to have cut his first tooth and to have sat up at 6 months, he stood at 10, took first 
steps at 13, walked at 14, and used single words at 18 months. He was the third of 3 
brothers, the two others being brighter, according to the mother. At the time of birth 
the father was 43 and the mother 35. Her health was poor during and after conception. 
The physical examination of the boy revealed a dull countenance, slightly enlarged 
tonsils, two carious teeth, slightly outstanding ears, tinnitus, mildly impaired hearing, 
a low hair line and turned-in toes. By the 1908 and 1911 scales he was retarded 2.1 
years (I. Q. .78). By the Seguin form board he w^s retarded almost a year and a half 
by the combined norms and almost two and a half by the writer's norms. He failed 
on the Healy-Fernald form board A after 1 minute 30 seconds, placing only 3 blocks 
properly in 22 moves. He failed on the X-year designs (visual imagination) and 
repeated four digits backward but failed on five backward (auditory memory). He 
was able to read a few short monosyllables but could not read "on," "bed" or "in." 
His percentiles in standing and sitting height, weight, and right and left grip were 
60, 80, 75, 83, and 87, thus being above average in physical development. He was 
diagnosed as not above "very backward" or borderline in general intelligence, with 
visual aphasia as a suspected complication, the conditions probably being due to the 
mother's poor health during gestation, to the boy's cyanotic condition incident to the 

*See Experimental Studies of Mental Defectives, 1912, p. 130. 



50 Miami University 

prolonged and difficult labor which may have produced ruptures of some of the 
cerebral capillaries or injuries to some of the brain cells, and to cerebral trauma from 
the two accidents. He was recommended for a try-out in an ungraded class. But he 
failed to receive the advantages of individual instruction in such a class because none 
was available in his district, and he was referred again to the chnic in October, 1917. 
But the parents would not consent to the examination until January, 1918, when he 
was 11.83 years old. Another principal this time reported that "he is unable to learn 
out of books. His interest is in manual work but not in books. His best work is 
along mechanical lines, while his greatest interest is in games. His greatest defi- 
ciencies are in spelling, reading, memory and attention. He has acquired truant habits. 
His brother, 14 years old, is in the fifth grade, is slow but has good habits." He had 
now been advanced to IIP. He had had his adenoids and tonsils removed about a 
year prior to the second examination. When re-examined his thyroid was slightly 
enlarged, he had a slight tic about the mouth, and still needed dental attention. By 
the Stanford scale he was now retarded 2.8 years (I. Q. .76). In somewhat less than 
two years he had advanced 1.2 year in intelligence — the advance was probably greater, 
as the Stanford scale grades lower than the old scales — while he graded just the same 
by the Seguin form board, the retardation now amounting to 4.5 years by the 
combined norms and about five years by the writer's norms. Based on his school 
record in manual work, however, the Seguin rating does not do him justice. His 
reading was still extremely poor. He required 60 seconds to read to "fire" in the 
Stanford selection (^five words), but he received assistance on "New York" and "Sep- 
tember" and misread "5th." In the vocabulary test he did much better, scoring 6,484, 
which is superior to the X-year norm. The diagnosis of visual aphasia was definitely 
confirmed, while he was diagnosed as borderline from the standpoint of general intel- 
ligence. He was transferred to a special school in view of the unavailability of an 
ungraded class. The report from the special school at the end of the year indicated 
that his record was "good" in physical games, "fair" in formal motor training, 
calisthenics, wood work, raffia, gardening, oral language (grade IP) and geography 
(IIP), and poor in drawing, writing (grade II), reading (P), written language (P), 
speHing (P) and arithmetic (IP). His best vrork was along manumental lines, and 
poorest work in reading, spelling and written language. He did not get the spelling 
tests, but in the arithmetic tests he scored 8 in A, 6 in B, 2 in C, 5 in D, 1 in E and 3 
in G. These are all less than III- except G, but how much less cannot be determined. 
The tests, however, tend to confirm the report of the teacher that he did better in 
arithmetic than reading. 

Both of the above poor readers happened to be visual aphasia cases, while tvro 
other conspicuously poor readers whom we have already discussed in the section on 
spelling (numbers Ten and Eleven) were also cases of partial visual aphasia, or 
dyslexia. It should not be inferred from this that all cases of conspicuously poor 
reading should be ascribed to visual aphasia. We have examined many poor readers 
among children whose parents were immigrants or who habitually spoke a foreign 
language in the home. The poor reading in many cases was undoubtedly due to the 
pupils' linguistic handicap. In a number of instances the poor reading ability has been 
traced to optical defects, or defects in hearing, or defective distribution of attention. 
In innumerable cases it has been due to very grave deficiency in general intelligence 
(idiocy and imbecility) and therefore not to visual aphasia. Nevertheless, it is 
probable that the instances in which poor reading ability is directly traceable to visual 
aphasia or dyslexia are more numerous than is usually suspected. Between September, 
1914, and June, 1919, we identified in the St. Louis schools about 90 cases of visual 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 51 

aphasia and dyslexia,* varying in intelligence from normal to borderline and high-grade 
feeble-minded. Prior to this we had identified a number of cases whose records are 
not now at our command. Doubtless many cases in the St. Louis schools have not been 
referred to us at all, as our examinations have perforce been limited to the children of 
the lowest degree of general intelligence. Whether due to a specific lesion of the 
left angular (and supra-marginal) gyrus or to a biological variation, resulting in the 
impairment of visual word images, we have not found that there is any essential 
difference in the different grades of the defect. The different degrees of word- 
bhndness (as the condition is also known) are probably quantitative variations of the 
same neuro-psychic trait. Nor have we been able to accept Hinshelwood's criterion, 
that the symptoms must be pure, that is, the condition must not be accompained by 
any other brain defect. Hinshelwood restricts the application of the term "congenital 
word blindness" to very serious degrees of visual aphasia in which all the cerebral 
areas other than the angular gyrus are normal and undamaged, "dyslexia" is applied 
to the slighter degrees of the defect, while "congenital alexia" is restricted to the 
inability to learn to read in mental defectives who are suffering from a generalized 
cerebral defect. We fail to see, however, why a defect in the left angular gyrus may 
not coexist with various degrees of defect in other cerebral areas, without producing 
any essential alteration in the nature of the word blindness. Even if cerebral areas 
closely related to reading were affected it would only add complications to the primal 
regional defect. It would accentuate the degree of the defect rather than producing 
essential qualitative changes. There was empirically no warrant for restricting the 
application of "congenital word blindness" in accordance with Hinshelwood's recom- 
mendation, for none of the cases cited by him or his predecessors were psychologically 
tested to determine whether they were strictly normal. We have psychologically 
examined all of our cases in the course of our ordinary routine, and hope to pubhsh 
the data some time in the future.f Here we must be content with the general state- 
ment that few of our word-blind cases were strictly normal in intelligence while few 
were affected so gravely that they could not learn to read at all. The large majority 
were cases of dyslexia rather than of visual aphasia. We find it convenient to restrict 
the application of the term "visual aphasia" (or alexia) to the graver degrees of word- 
bUndness, and the term "dyslexia" to the lighter degrees, while using "word-bHndness" 
as the generic term. But we do not consider that there is any essential qualitative 
difference between visual aphasia and dyslexia. They are merely gradations of the 
same phenomenon. 

It would be advisable to bring children with specific reading defect together in 
special classes, in order that the pedagogical treatment of the disability could be 
intensively studied under the best experimental conditions. We have tried two or 
three methods during the last seven years, in some cases with considerable success, in 
other cases with very meagre results considering the large expenditure of time and 
energy made by the teachers. 

The methods v^^e have used are, briefly, as follows: 1. A synthetic procedure, 
leading from the alphabetic to the word method, and finally to the sentence method. 
The first step is to develop visual memories of the separate letters of the alphabet, 
both small and capital, so the child can recognize them by sight. We have ordinarily 
begun with the script symbols. The teacher presents the visual symbol of the letter and 
names it. The child repeats the name aloud. He should also be required to write it. 

*Hinshelwood met with 31 cases in 15 years. We assume that these cases came to him merely as 
an incident to his regular eye practice. Many of his cases were acquired. All of ours are congenital. 

tA study has already appeared. Congenital Word Blindness— Some Analyses of Cases. The 
Training School Bulletin, 1920, 76-84, 93-99. 



52 Miami University 

In this procedure an appeal was made to visual, auditory, glosso-motor and grapho- 
motor sensations. The auditory and motor associations, if the mechanism is intact, 
should aid in the fixation of the visual letter images. Without the letter images the 
child cannot learn to recognize the letters. Where there is word blindness, but not 
letter blindness, the development of letter recognition does not present any serious 
obstacles. But where there is letter blindness of considerable severity it is very diffi- 
cult to develop visual images even of the small number of impressions corresponding 
to the small and capital letters in print and script. The number of letters is very small 
indeed compared with the hundreds of thousands of word symbols. The next step is 
to have the child spell the words aloud letter by letter. If the mechanism is intact the 
auditory and glosso-motor imagery will aid in the visual recognition of the word. 
Spelling the word aloud over and over again will help to fix the association between 
the visual impression and its sound and meaning. While many of these children are 
poor in oral as well as in written spelling, many can spell words orally (and sometimes 
graphically ) which they cannot recognize visually. It is important to begin with phonetic 
and short words. In the third place, have the pupil also write the words, sometimes 
naming the letters aloud as he writes and sometimes pronouncing the words after they 
have been written. In the fourth place, drill the pupil in the recognition of the whole 
word by sight— word calling. When the pupil has acquired a sufficient number of word 
memories he should be able to read sentences at sight. He should then, finally, be 
given much practice in sentence reading. Hinshelwood supplements a somev/hat simi- 
lar procedure by the use of the tactual exploration of letters cut out of wood. We have 
had pupils trace raised and depressed letters with the finger; we have also had pupils 
who were incapable of making fine co-ordinations trace letters on the ground with a 
large stick or in the air with the whole arm movement, but we are not ready to pass 
judgment on the value of these devices. It is necessary to repeat the above exercises 
again and again, sometimes for a long period of time. It is better to give the drills 
in several short periods a day than in one long period. Reading drills cause much 
fatigue and confusion in the case of most word blind pupils. 

The following is a very much simpler procedure: The teacher shows monosyl- 
labic words separately in printed and written form and pronounces them. The child 
pronounces the syllable and writes it. This process it repeated again and again until 
the child gets a foundation of visual word images. Thereafter use may be made of 
the ordinary word and sentence methods. This has proved fairly effective with some 
poor readers. Grace M. Fernald has found it successful with some apparently hopeless 
cases — e. g., a girl who was unable to read and who had been diagnosed as moron was 
taught to read by this method and promoted into high school where she did good work.* 

Clara Schmitt has studied the use of several well-known methods in combination; 
action by the pupil in response to commands presented through sight words and 
sentences, phonic drills presented in stories, analysis of sound forms in words, using 
sentences, and the writing of phonetic words on the board. 

The most recent studies of congenital visual aphasia and dyslexia may be found 
in: James Hinshelwood, Congenital Word-Blindness, 1917; Augusta F. Bronner, Psychol- 
ogy of Special Abilities and DisabiHties, 1917; Clara Schmitt, Development Alexia: 
Congenital Word-Blindness, or Inability to Read, the Elementary School Journal, 1918, 
68f. and 757f . C. H. HeitmuUer, Cases of Developmental Alexia or Congenital Word- 

•The following study should be consulted, which has appeared since the above was written 
Fernald, Grace M., and Keller, Helen. The Effect of Kinaesthetic Factors in the Development of Word 
Recognition in the Case of Non-Readers. Journal of Educational Research, 1921, pp. 395-377— a record 
of very suggestive experiments. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 53 

Blindness, Washington Medical Annals, XVIII, No. 2; J. E. Wallace Wallin, Congenital 
Word-Blindness — Some Analyses of Cases, The Training School Bulletin, 1920, pp. 
76-84, and 93-99. 

It is somewhat difficult to select instances of good readers from the Gray records 
because there is practically no difference in the raw scores in the scale from IIP to 
VHP.* The score in IIP is 50 as against 49 in IV^, 52 in IV^ between 49 and 51 in 
grades V to VIII, and 51 in VHP. The fact that the raw scores are practically the 
same from the third to the eighth grade is not due, however, to the fact that the 
successive paragraphs do not gradually increase in difficulty, or to the fact that the 
pupils do not improve as we go up the grades, but to the diminishing amount of 
credit arbitrarily allocated to the first paragraph in each successive grade. Thus the 
value assigned to paragraph one for a pupil in grade I is 55, in grade II 35, in grade III 
30, in grade IV 25, in grade V 20, in grade VI 15, in grade VII 10, and in grade VIII 5, 
while the value for the other paragraphs remains the same in all grades, namely, 
5 (except paragraph 11, where the value is 10). It is evident, therefore, that the 
lower the grade classification given the child the higher will be the score which he 
will receive. In order to compensate for this tendency of the scores to attenuate as 
we go up the grades Gray has given a diagram in which "all scores which lie on the 
same horizontal level represent equal amounts of achievement." The scores can, of 
course, be rendered comparable by subtracting from the scores in a given grade the 
added credit which was given for paragraph one in all the lower grades. 

A practical obstacle in connection with this differential scheme of rating is the 
initial difficulty of determining just the grade in which the child shall be classified. 
Shall we classify a child as second grade merely because he happens to be in the 
second grade or merely because, say, he has been in school tv»^o years? Is it immaterial 
whether he has been in school two years, or four or five years? The fact that the 
child is in the second grade may not at all indicate that he is doing second grade work 
in reading. He may be especially weak or especially strong in reading, so that if the 
classification is to be based on the estimate of actual achievement in reading, we 
should have the practical difficulty of determining whether to rate him as, say, first, 
second or third grade. This practical difficulty constantly confronts one in giving the 
tests to special school children, who may not be classified in any grade, who may be 
doing a different grade of work in every branch and who may have been in school 
during widely varying periods of time. If the mistake were made of grading a 
third grade pupil as second grade the error would not be very large, amounting to 
only five points. But if a second grade pupil were rated as a first grade pupil the 
error would amount to 20 points, and wholly misleading and ridiculous results could 
easily be obtained, as we shall show in connection with one of our cases. 

Another serious difficulty caused by this arbitrary method of rating is that it is 
alm.ost impossible to compare the achievement of our special school children indifferent 
B.-S. ages and in different intelligence classifications with the achievement of the 
normal children in the different grades, owing to the fact that the children in a given 
B.-S. age or in a given intelligence classification are classified in different grades in 
reading. Children in the same classification may therefore be rated on a different basis 
in reading. 

For these reasons it seems preferable to give uniform credit for the same unit of 
work, as has been done in the spiral arithmetic exercises, in the spelling tests and in 
many other educational tests. Comparable results can only be secured if the unit of 
measurement is kept uniform. Indeed we can only compare the scores in the Gray 

*Gray, as before, p. 126 



54 Miami University 

scale after the initial advantages in rating have been deducted, so that the basis is 
uniform for all grades. We have, however, followed Gray's method of scoring, in spite 
of the special difficulties involved. If anyone wishes to score our results differently we 
shall be glad to make the records available. 

We shall only examine the records of the two pupils who made the highest scores 
in the reading test. 

One of these, case Twenty-six, was a Mongolian type of mental defective, who was 
diagnosed at the time of the examination as a high grade imbecile and who will furnish 
a good illustration of the truth of the statement which we have already made, that 
Mongolian defectives frequently have specific ability in reading, as judged by their level 
of general intelligence and by their abihty along other lines. This girl was examined 
in December, 1914, when 9.5 years old. At that time she had been 3 years in school, 
over a year of this time being spent in special school. Her greatest capacities were said 
to be in reading and number, her greatest interests in music and her greatest defects 
in physical and manumental work. She proved to be 3.3 years backward by the 1908 
scale and 3.5 by the 1911 scale (I. Q. .63). By the Seguin form board she did somewhat 
better than a three year old child according to the combined norms. 

She was extremely crude in this type of motor performance. The first time she 
required 18 moves and 67 seconds to complete the task; the second time 40 moves and 
135 seconds; and the third time, 34 moves and 136 seconds. She was unable to read 
even monosyllables in print, although she was able to read script in school. Her per- 
centiles in standing and sitting height, weight, and right and left grip were 10, 30, 
20, and 5, and her head girth was that of a two or three year old child (18.6 inches). 
It is apparent that she was decidedly under-developed physically. She was given the 
Seguin form board test and certain anthropometric measurements on two later 
occasions. In the form board her performance advanced from about 3 years (67 
seconds) to almost 4 years (42 seconds) in July, 1915, and to about 5^ years (29 
seconds) in July, 1916. During the latter examination, at 11 years, her percentiles, in 
the order given above, were 20, 55, 20, 5 and 10. She had raised her position some- 
what in standing and sitting height and in strength of grip. Her head girth was 
now 19 inches, antero-posterior diameter 157 mm., transverse diameter 137 and 
cephalic index 87.3. The physical examination revealed short fingers and thumbs, a 
narrow palate, with a rather low and fiat dome; obliquely set eye-balls (mongoloid); 
a low broad forehead with a poorly defined hair line; a slender, sluggish tongue, and 
fissured mucosa; several carious teeth; a narrow superior dental arch, poor alignment 
of teeth, the lower central incisors articulating too far forward; small round outstand- 
ing ears; a small, broad nose, with small round nostrils, and a septum defiected to 
the right; anterior and post-nasal obsruction, with a chronic discharge; suspected 
myopia; and deficient neuro-muscular tonus. She walked with the feet wide apart. 
She had some of the typical physical stigmata of Mongolism. 

She was the first born of two sisters, the mother being 35 and the father 45 at the 
time of her birth. Both parents are dead. The mother was said to have been 
"nervous" and "insane", and the father mentally queer and alcoholic. The girl was 
born on time without difficulty or injury. She has only had whooping cough, measles 
and croup, all being followed by complete recovery. She cut her first tooth at 16 
months, sat at 9 months, but could not support the head, first stood at 18, took first 
steps and walked at 30, used single words at 11 and short phrases at 12 months. Her 
sister was said to be mentally normal. Generally only one Mongolian defective is 
born to a family. 

We have received four annual reports of the progress of this pupil in the special 
school. These reports have indicated that she does not Hke any kind of handwork 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 55 

and is very clumsy in motor activities, which is quite characteristic of Mongolians. 
In spool knitting she makes mistakes constantly and cannot correct them. She is 
slow to respond in games and physical training and follows directions poorly, although 
she has made considerable improvement in these activities. Although still very poor 
she has made considerable progress in writing. The report, in June, 1917, when she 
was twelve years, indicated, however, that she was doing IIP work in reading, and IIP 
in oral and written spelling, she was "very good" in oral language, and dramatization, 
while she only did P work in arithmetic, being unable to solve problems or do any 
mental arithmetic. Her greatest capacities were reported to be reading and spelling, 
and her greatest improvement during the year was in writing and participation in 
games. Her greatest faults were that "she is self-centered, greedy and eats like an 
animal." But in common with most Mongolian defectives, she is "cheerful and happy." 
The June, 1918, school record would lead us to infer that she had retrograded in 
reading and spelling, as she was only rated as IP in the former and P in the latter, 
while advancing to F in arithmetic. 

When we turn to the standardized tests we find that her score in the Gray oral 
reading test was 56.25 which is 4.25 points higher than the raw score in any grade in 
the St. Louis elementary schools, and 6.25 higher than grade IIP. We find, however, 
that this score was based upon second grade classification, so that children in the third 
and fourth grades to do equally well would have to earn only 51.25 and 46.25 points, 
respectively. The IIP norms for the normal pupils is 1.25 less and for the IV- 2.75 
higher. If our subject were classified in the third grade, as she was reported in June, 
1917, and given a score of 51.25, she would still grade somewhat better than IIP. In 
the Ayres spelling test she did a little better than "the second grade in I, but only 
spelled 5 words in L and one word in O. In the Starch test she reached the first 
grade standard in I and a little better than first grade in II. She was not given the 
spiral arithmetic exercises because it was a "foregone conclusion that she could not do 
any of them." It is perfectly evident from the school reports and standardized tests 
that this girl had special aptitude in reading, especially as compared with spelling and 
arithmetic. 

Case Twenty-seven was examined in September, 1917, at the age of 11 years. She 
had been over 5 years in school and had been advanced to IIP, without any probablility 
of being promoted. She was reported best in reading and handwork and poorest in 
arithmetic and spelling. In school she was "subject to nervous chills terminating in 
crying spells." She was born on time after a protracted labor of two days. Three 
years before the examination she became subject to grand mal attacks, which stopped 
for a year, and then returned. She had had none for over half a year before the examina- 
tion. She was slow in her early development, cutting her first tooth at 10 months, 
first standing at 14 months, taking her first steps when about two years, walking a 
little later, not using single words until she was two and not using phrases until after 
two. She was the fifth of seven children, two of the others being dead. The physical 
examination showed that she was a mouth breather, that she had enlarged tonsils, 
possibly adenoids and one carious tooth, and that her nervous tone was poor. Her 
speech was very indistinct, owing to a severe lisp. By the Stanford scale she was re- 
tarded 3 years (I. Q. 79) while she was extremely slow to respond in the Seguin form 
board, measuring about five years retarded. An unfavorable prognosis was made, 
owing to probable cerebral trauma from the epileptic convulsions, and she was assigned 
to a special school as a "potential mental defective." 

The report from the special school at the end of the year (June, 1918), indicated 
that she had little power in physical and mental games, calisthenics, knitting, sewing. 



56 LIiAi.ii Univeijsity 

drawing and writing. She did about second grade work in reading and arithmetic, first 
grade work in spelling and was "good" in reproducing memory gems and stories. Her 
greatest improvement and capacities were in "academic work," she makes good effort 
at times and she is "hysterical" in disposition. 

In the oral reading test she scored 63.75, which is decidedly higher than any score 
obtained among normal children. Since the score was based upon the first grade base' 
children in the second and third grade to do equally well would only have to earn 
43.75 and 38.75. It is evident that her excessively high score is due to the fact that she 
was classified in the first grade instead of the second grade, as she had been 
independently reported to the clinic. If we assume that the second grade classification 
is more nearly correct, her score falls about midway between IP and IP. It is evident 
that, although she had been given the highest "raw" score among all our special school 
pupils, she is inferior to many who received a lower raw score. Nevertheless v/e 
consider that she possesses more ability in reading and arithmetic than in any other 
line of work. In the Ayres test she spelled only 1, 2, and 6 words in columns O, L, and 
I, while she did somewhat better in the Starch Hsts, doing a trifle better than first gi'ade 
work. In the spiral arithmetic exercises she did 7 examples in A, 2 in B, 3 in C, 3 in 
E, 2 in J and one in M. These results are all decidedly below the lowest norms 
supplied (third grade) except in E, J and M, which are about equal to third grade. 

COMPARISON OF THE EFFICIENCY SCORES OF MENTALLY 
DEFECTIVE WITH NORMAL PUPILS 

The normal norms are based upon the scores obtained in the survey of the St. 
Louis schools. This survey was made in June, a few weeks later in the school year 
than our survey of the special schools was made. 

The scores made by our special school pupils were uniformly lower than those 
made by the normal pupils in the corresponding grades, the efficiency of the special 
schools in grade I amounting to 16% of the normal grade P score; in grade II, 84% of 
the normal IP scores; in grade III, 87% of the normal grade IIP score; and in grade 
IV, 95% of the normal grade IV- score. The score in our third grade v/as less than 
the normal IP score (which, however, is somewhat higher than IIP in the St. Louis 
scale of norms), while the score in our fourth grade is approximately the same as 
the norms for IIP (or IP). It must not be forgotten that comparisons between 
different grades is complicated by the unequal value given the first paragraph in the 
different grades. 

In the B.-S. classificaton. Table XIV, the average scores in all the ages fell below 
the normal P or IP standard (the raw IP standard is only one point higher than P). 
Only the scores in ages VIII to XI even approximated the P or IP norms. These 
comparisons, however, are of limited value, because exact comparison between the 
normal grade scores and the B.-S. age scores cannot be made owing to the use of a 
different basis of scoring for pupils in different grades. The same remark applies to 
com_parison with our diagnosis scores. 

In the diagnosis classification only the borderline and backward even remotely 
approximate the raw norms for grades P or IP. The score for the highest group of 
mental defectives, the morons, is only 47% as large as the raw score for the normal P 
grade, or 49% of the normal IP score. The P score, however, is practically equal to 
the beginning of the second grade, and the IP score to the beginning of IP, since the 
test in the regular grades was given at the end of the school year. 

If, now, we deduct 20 points, which equals the artificial advantage given the normal 
first grade pupils, and allow for the difference in the school year when the tests were 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



57 



given, we may say that our backward and borderline did about as well as the pupils at 
the end of the second grade or beginning of the third, while the morons did about as 
well as the pupils at the beginning of the second grade third quarter. 



TABLE XIX 
AVERAGE RATE OF READING AND AVERAGE NUMBER OF ERRORS 



Grade 


No. of 
Pupils 


No. of 
Seconds 


No. of 
Errors 


I 

II 

Ill 

IV 


Paragraph 1 


160* 

87 

45 

4 

39 

84 
45 
4 


130.44 
34.32 
25 
24. 

106.82 
55 5 
38.95 
40. 


12.38 

2 26 

148 

.75 


J 


Paragraph 4 


8 84 


II 

Ill 

IV ... 




4.83 
2.42 




2. 




Paragraph 8 




II........ 

Ill 


18 
23 

4 


83.5 

74.56 
45.25 


11 5 
9 39 


IV . . 


6 75 






■ 



There were a few morons and borderline whose raw scores were equal to or superior 
to the third grade score. There were four such cases among the 66 morons, or 6% of 
the morons. The scores of one of these pupils was based on third grade classification, 
two on second grade and one on first grade. If we assign to the latter pupil a second 
grade rating he will be reduced to second grade status in the test (reduced from 60 to 40) . 
If the pupils rated as second grade were given a third grade rating, only one, with 48.75 
points, would reach the third grade score. It is evident that only a negligible number of 
our morons reached the third grade level in the test. 

Ten of the 45 borderline pupils (22%) reached or exceeded the third grade score. 
Two of these, however, had been classified in the first grade, although the regular 
annual report to the clinic indicated that they did second grade work. If classified as 
of second grade for the purpose of this evaluation their scores would fall below 
the first grade standard. Three of the other pupils were classified in the second grade, 
four in the third grade and one in the fourth. As we should expect, a larger percentage 
of borderline children than morons reached the third grade standard. 

In order to appreciate the significance of the figures on time and errors given in 
Table XIX, we have computed the following indices showing the increased amount of 
time required by the mental defectives to read paragraphs I, IV and VIII, and the 
increased number of errors which they made in reading these paragraphs, as compared 
with the pupils in the regular grades in the St. Louis schools. We have confined the 
comparison to the paragraphs for which norms are available. The indices are obtained 
by dividing the figures obtained from the pupils in the regular grades! into the figures 
for the mental defectives classified in the corresponding grade. 



♦The discrepancy in the number of subjects given under this paragraph and the nuniber given in 
Table XIII is due to the fact that the time was not recorded for some of the pupils who failed completely. 
tSee Gray, as before, p. 133. 



58 



Miami University 



Paragraph I 



Time 



Error 



Paragraph IV 



Time Error 



Paragraph VIII 



Time Error 



Grade I... 
Grade II.. 
Grade III 
Grade IV 



3.00 
1.47 
1.30 
1.53 



6.83 
2.93 
2.59 
2. 02 



1.78 
1.67 
1 46 
1.83 



3.17 
272 
1.53 
172 



2 05 
2.31 
1.52 



2.75 
2 71 
2.25 



The figures show that it took the mentally deficient pupils from one and a third 
to three times as long to read a paragraph as the pupils in the regular schools who were 
classified in the same grade, although the mental deficients averaged three or four 
years older in chronological age in each grade, as shown in Table XIII. In regard to 
the number of errors made in the reading, the comparison is even more unfavorable to 
the subnormals. They made from one and a half to almost seven times as many errors 
as the regular grade pupils, making relatively more errors in the lower grades. It is to 
be remembered that this does not include errors in the nature of speech defects which 
are more numerous among the mental defectives. In our investigation of speech de- 
fectives in the St. Louis schools in 1915, we found ten times as many speech defectives 
in the special schools as in the white elementary schools.* 



GENERAL CONCLUSIONS 

The process of reading is entirely too difficult for mental defectives and 
subnormals of kindergarten grade and III- and IV-year mentalities. All the 
kindergarten pupils and Ill-year olds (B.-S.) and 10 of the 11 IV-year olds 
failed completely in the oral reading test. Moreover, the large marjority of 
the imbeciles, V-year olds and pupils classified in the first grade also failed 
completely in the oral reading test. Of the 164 first grade pupils, 123 scored 
zero; of the 36 imbeciles, 27 scored zero; and of the 26 V-year olds, 21 scored 
zero. The scores of 3 of the V-year olds who succeeded in the test were 
merely nominal, 1.25, 1.25, and 2.5. All three had been diagnosed as imbeciles. 
The other two scored 13.75 and 17.5 and had been diagnosed, respectively, as 
moron and as deferred. Four among the imbeciles who scored made only 
from 1.25 to 2.5 points. At the time of the examination their mentalities were 
V, V, 5.3 and 6.6. The scores of the other five imbeciles were 12.5, 13.75, 
16.25, 43.75 and 56.25, while their mental ages at the time of the examination 
were VI, VII, 4.2, 6.2 (Stanford) and VI. The largest of these scores was 
m.ade by a Mongolian while the pupil with the four-year mentality was also a 
Mongolian. 

Certainly the teaching of reading to imbeciles and mental defectives who 
have not reached a mentality of about six years does not result in the 
acquisition of any useful form of skill. We could cite numerous instances of 
imbeciles barely reaching a V-year mentality who after six or seven years of 
instruction in reading do not read as well as a normal first grade child. If 
we exclude the higher grade of the two Mongolians (case Twenty-six) only 
one imbecile even approximately reached first grade status in the test. This 
pupil graded 6.2 by the Stanford scale. At the time she was 11.08 years old, 
thus being retarded 4.8 years (I. Q. 56). She made a score of 43.75, 



*Report of the Psycho-Educational Clinic and Special Schools, in the Annual Report of the Board 
of Education of the City of St. Louis for the year 1915-1916, pp. 174-211. 

A Census of Speech Defectives Among 89,057 Pubhc School Pupils— A Preliminary Report, 
School and Society, 1916, 213f. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 59 

computed from the second grade base, which is superior to normal IP. The 
record from the special and elementary schools does not indicate that she 
was especially strong in reading, although she was said to be poorest in 
arithmetic. According to the special school report she did second grade work. 
The writer has never hitherto diagnosed a child as an imbecile who could do 
second grade work, nor does he believe that a child who could do second 
grade work could be properly so diagnosed. Had this child been examined 
by the old B.-S. scales she would probably have graded between seven and 
eight mentally and would thus, according to the usual standards, have 
approximated the status of a "moron." From what we know of this girl now 
we believe that she is more properly classified as a moron than an imbecile.* 

Excluding this girl, therefore, and the two Mongolians, the highest score 
made by anyone whom we had diagnosed as an imbecile was 13.75, by a seven 
year mentality, which is only about one-third of the normal P score. 

Binet has made the statement that an imbecile cannot be taught to com- 
municate in writing or to read writing or print. He used the ability to learn 
to read as a differential point between the imbecile and debile or high grade 
feeble-minded. The debile can read somewhat and communicate simple 
thoughts in writing. Seguin said that the imbecile learns to "read more or 
less," but he did not sharply distinguish between "idiots," "imbeciles," and 
the higher grades of mental defectives. We are inclined to agree with Binet 
and feel that it is probably preferable to draw the upper limit of imbecility at 
a mentality of six rather than seven, as has been done. Certainly with the 
Stanford scale it would be hazardous to maintain that an individual who does 
not develop beyond seven mentally is an imbecile. Practically, of course, the 
exact location of the threshold between the imbecile and the moron is of far 
less importance than the location of the upper threshold of the moron, or high- 
est grade of the feeble-minded. Let us be quick to add that a child cannot be 
designated an imbecile purely on the basis of inability to learn to read. There 
are specific causes, in addition to imbecility, of incapacity in reading. 

Although instruction in reading for imbeciles and for children whose intelli- 
gence is under six, represents a great financial waste and a waste of much 
effort on the part of teachers and pupils, yet, owing to the importunity of 
parents, it would not be politic to attempt to eliminate such instruction entirely. 
But, after the low grade deficient has been given a fair trial, the time 
devoted to reading should be considerably reduced, while the instruction should 
be limited to the rudiments and to familiarizing the child with word-symbols 
the recognition of which will help him to adjust himself to his environment. 

There is a marked increase in reading ability from grade to grade, even when 
measured by the raw scores, and from intelligence category to intelligence 
category, when the comparison is limited to the main categories (the backward 
excepted), while the increase is less regular from intelligence age (B.-S.) to 
intelligence age. The greatest gains were made by the second grade compared 
with the first, by the morons compared with the imbeciles and by the B.-S. VI- 



•We have on numerous occasions called attention to the fact that the Stanford revision grades 
lower than the older versions. We have no hesitancy in affirming that the Stanford scale graded this 
girl too low. The standards of diagnosis which have been based on the old scales cannot be uncritically 
applied when the Stanford scale is used. For criticisms of the Stanford scale see our articles on 
PreUminary Impressions of the Stanford Revision of the Binet-Simon Scale, The Psychological Clinic, 

1918, If. 

The Value of the Intelligence Quotient for Individual Diagnosis, The Journal of Delinquency, 

1919, 109f . 

The results of Retests by Means of the Binet Scale, The Journal of Educational Psychology. 
1921, 391f. 



60 Miami University 

year olds compared with the V-year olds. We have already suggested certain 
reasons why the large gains occur at these points. The exceptions which are 
found to the general tendency are due to differences in chronological age, in 
intelHgence age and in length of time in school, to the presence, in some cate- 
gories, of children with specific reading defect, to the limited number of cases, 
and to the employment of a differential scheme of weighting the raw scores. 

3 The improvement from grade to grade was relatively greater for the men- 
tally defective and subnormal pupils than for the normal pupils. Because 
the most deficient of the subnormals made a very low score, the subnormal 
group was able to improve more with rising grade, in harmony with our 
earher finding, that the backward and mentally defective improve more than 
the normal from practice, owing to the fact that they make a lower initial 
score. The normals make a better initial adjustment hence improve less. 
In offering the above explanation, however, we must not lose sight of the fact 
that the curves of improvement are dependent upon a scheme of unequal 
weighting which may affect the two groups differently. 

4 The scores in the different grades among the special school pupils are lower 
than the scores in the corresponding grades among the regular grade pupils. 
The fourth grade specials were about equal to the III- normals. The average 
score for all of the subnormals who had been examined was not quite equal 
to one-half of the raw score for the normal P grade or IP grade. The scores 
in the latter grades were only approximated by the pupils with mentalities 
from VIII to XI, or by those v>?ho graded as borderline or backward. The 
highest grade of the mental defectives, the morons, only did 47% as well as 
the normal ¥ pupils or 46% as well as the II- pupils. Had some of these 
pupils been given a first grade base instead of a second and third grade base 
they would have received higher raw scores. If we deduct the 20 points of 
preferred credit given the pupils in the first grade compared with those in 
the second grade, we shall probably do ample justice to the morons. Under 
this process of equalization we find that: 

5 Our backward and borderline pupils, who average more than 12 years of age, 
are equal to the normal pupils at the end of the second grade or beginning of 
the third grade, while our morons, who average over 13 years, are about equal 
to the pupils in the second grade third quarter. Only an insignificant number 
of our morons were equal to or superior to third grade pupils, while about 
18% of the borderline reached or exceeded the third grade standard. 

The conclusions which we thus reach, based on the Gray oral reading test, 
regarding the reading ability of the highest grade of mental defectives, is in 
harmony with the conclusions earlier reached from the analysis of the reading 
ratings given such pupils by the teachers in the St. Louis special schools. 
86.4% of the pupils reported upon by the teachers did from sub-kindergarten 
to second-grade work, 9.7% third grade work and 3.7% fourth grade work. 
Analysis of the clinical records indicated that some of the pupils doing third 
and fourth grade work could scarcely be classed as feeble-minded. The 
conclusion announced was that "we do not seem to have found any consider- 
able number of feeble-minded school children who are able to do third grade 
work successfully, except in one or two branches. The possible pedagogical 
attainments of the majority of them have varied from decidedly less than 
kindergarten standard to second grade standard.* 

•The Pedagogical Status of the Feeble-Minded School Children, The Elementary School 
Journal, 1918, pp. 588-597. 

The Achievement of Mental Defectives in Standardized Educational Tests, School and Society, 
1919, pp. 250-256. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 61 

Our study of the reading potentialities of the highest grade of the 
feebleminded reemphasizes the same important practical conclusion 
reached in considering spelling: pupils who are capable of doing work in 
reading equal to or above the third grade standard should not be assigned 
to special classes for the mentally defective but to ungraded classes when it 
is possible to establish such classes. Exceptions to this rule would include 
mental defectives who have special talents in reading. We have found a few 
such cases but we did not find a single mental defective among those 
examined who possessed any remarkable talent in reading, although such 
instances have been reported in the literature. 

6 The mentally defective and subnormal children, although averaging 3 or 4 
years older in each grade, required from one and a third to three times as 
much time to read the paragraphs in the Gray scale, while they made from 
one and a half to seven times as many errors, as the normal pupils in corres- 
ponding grades. 

7 The girls surpassed the boys in the reading test, the superiority amounting to 
29% when based upon general averages for all the special school pupils (Table 
XIII), and 23% when based on general averages for all the examined pupils. 
The same result has been found among normal pupils. The girls proved to 
be superior to the boys when the reading test was given to the regular grades 
in the St. Louis schools. 

In harmony with the finding that girls are more proficient than boys in read- 
ing is the correlative fact that the vast majority of children subject to word 
blindness are boys (See Congenital Word Blindness, The Training School Bul- 
letin, 1920, 76ff, 93ff), while the majority of speech defectives are also boys 
( See Report on Speech Defectives in the St. Louis Schools, Report of the Board 
of Education for the year 1915-1916, pp. 174-211). The data are not available 
for an adequate explanation of these facts, although various hypotheses have 
been suggested. 

8 Subnormal and mentally defective children show marked individual variation 
in reading capacity. Our results indicate that when pupils are graded homo- 
geneously as to intelligence age the variability amounts to more than half the 
mean score in most of the ages. The variability in the lower grades (but above 
the first grade) among the normal pupils is only from one-half to one-fifth as 
large as the variability in the different B.-S. ages from VI to IX. It is possible, 
of course, that the variability among the subnormal children is smaller in the 
grade classification than in the B.-S. There are children in all B.-S. ages ex- 
cept age X who completely fail in the test. 

We find numerous children with conspicuous defects in reading, out of all 
proportion to their intelligence or their status in one or more of the other lit- 
erary branches, and others with special ability in reading, although the pupils 
with marked ability were not very numerous among those who were given the 
test. 

9 Among the pupils who showed special ability in reading, relative to their 
intelligence level and ability in other branches, are included two of three Mongo- 
lians who were tested. Mongolians are conspicuously crude in motor co-ordina- 
tion, and frequently do their best work in reading. 

10 All of the four pupils referred to in this section and in the section on spelling 
as having made conspicuously poor records in reading had been diagnosed as 
cases of visual aphasia or dyslexia. All of these pupils were boys. One had 
been diagnosed as backward (number Ten), one as very backward or border- 



62 Miami University 

line (number Eleven), and two as borderline (numbers Twenty-four and Twenty- 
five). All except one were also conspicuously poor in spelling, while one did 
somewhat better in spelling. We have frequently found with other cases of 
word-blindness that deficiency in spelling ability accompanies the deficiency 
in reading ability. Naturally this is to be expected so far as concerns written 
spelling. But all of those who have been poor in written spelling whom we 
have tested orally have also been poor in oral spelling. This must be more than 
a coincidence. We are not ready to say that this is due to the fact that weakness 
in visual word imagery is paralleled by a weakness in auditory word imagery, 
interfering with the ability to combine letters into words. It may be remarked 
that all of these pupils were better in oral than in written language. Three 
were better in number work than in reading or spelling while we have no data 
on the other pupil. As is well known, visual aphasia usually does not involve 
number symbols in addition to word or letter symbols. Nevertheless instances 
of total asymboly are not lacking. 

11 It is perfectly obvious that our results do not justify the sweeping claim which 
has been constantly put forth by some advocates of the use of intelligence tests, 
that children should be placed in the school grade corresponding to their in- 
telligence age. The assumption is that when there is a discrepancy between 
the school classification and the intelligence age, the school grading is all wrong 
and the child should be demoted or promoted according as he has been graded 
too high or too low as determined by his intelligence level. While this prin- 
ciple is no doubt frequently valid and while classification according to intelli- 
gence age is superior to classification according to chronological age, yet the 
fallacy of the dogma when uncritically applied is obvious without extended 
refutation. Some children have specific defects which interfere with the 
acquisition of certain types of subject-matter, while others have specific abilities 
which facilitate certain types of acquisition. Some are energetic, industrious, 
ambitious, others apathetic, inert, and indolent. It is evident that all types 
cannot be satisfactorily classified in their school work on the basis of a general 
intelligence score. Obviously they must be classified in at least certain subjects 
according to their specific abilities and disabilities (especially). We are con- 
stantly required to assign some children according to their stage of instruction 
rather than according to their intelligence age. However given a high intell- 
igence index and no special disabilities, our constant aim should be so to ex- 
pedite the child's promotion that the school grading will rapidly approximate 
the intelligence level. 

12 Our findings with respect to word-blindness reported here and elsewhere* 
are of great practical importance. We do not recall ever to have read a single 
psychological, psychopathic or educational (not even in reading) survey of 
children made in the public schools of this country — and there have been surveys 
a plenty during the last few years, in which any suggestion was conveyed that 
some of the pupils might have been word-blind, or that the primary reason for 
the child's educational or intellectual inefiiciency was word-blindness in some 
degree. Indeed so far as current educational practice in the vast majority of 
the schools of the country is concerned, visual aphasia and dyslexia are purely 
abstract, meaningless, academic concepts, of no consequence to the practical 



'Meeting the Needs of the Mentally Handicapped Child in School, Ohio Bulletin of Charities and 
Correction, 1919, June; Congenital Word-Blindness — Some Analyses of Cases, The Training School 
Bulletin, 1920, 76ff, 93ff . The Problems Confronting a Psycho-Educational Clinic in a Large Municipality, 
Mental Hygiene, 1920, 103-136. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 63 

educator, classroom teacher, or psychological or educational testers. And yet 
our investigations have shown that many children have failed wretchedly in 
their school work primarily because of word-blindness, the word-blindness 
interfering with their acquisition of all types of subject-matter presented 
through visual verbal symbols, and that because of this affection they have 
frequently been assigned to classes for the feeble-minded when they have been 
normal or merely backward in intelligence, although the non-feeble-minded 
grades of word-blind children should be assigned to ungraded classes. In fact, 
it would be far better for the children and for the science of education if word- 
blind pupils of normal or near-normal intelligence were assigned to classes 
specifically restricted to such children where the corrective pedagogy of word- 
blindness would be intensively studied, and where, at any rate, the pupils 
could be given the advantages of oral presentations and of special mechanical, 
craft and artistic instruction when indicated. We would urge upon school 
administrators the great practical importance of affording children who are 
very poor in reading the advantages of a careful, expert examination in order 
to determine whether the primary defect is a defect in general intelligence, or 
a specific defect in visual word imagery, or a combination of the two. 
Fortunately auditory aphasia, or word deafness, a condition in which the child 
is unable to grasp, or grasps very feebly, the meaning of words heard, is far 
less common. We have found this condition in only one boy — cited in the 
chapter on the arithmetic test, and he is not a very clear case because of other 
complications, — among the thousands of children whom we have individually 
examined during the last decade. 
13 For the purpose of measuring the reading achievement of subnormal and 
mentally defective pupils assigned to special classes Gray's scheme of weighted 
credits has not proved very satisfactory: first, because of the initial difficulty 
of assigning a correct grade classification to the child; second, because our 
groupings according to intelligence age and diagnosis contain pupils classified 
in various grades according to reading, in consequence of which the basis of 
scoring the reading records may differ widely for the pupils in the same 
grouping, so that the tendencies v/hich we wish to trace may thereby be con- 
cealed or be distorted; and, third, the raw scores give an erroneous conception 
of the improvement of normal pupils from grade to grade (and of subnormals 
also), unless correction or allowance is made for the extra credits given in the 
lower grades, which at best involves a cumbersome process. 



CHAPTER III. 



THE ACHIEVEMENT OF SUBNORMAL PUPILS 
IN THE SPIRAL ARITHMETIC EXERCISES 

The arithmetic test, given by the teacher who gave the reading test, was 
administered between Jan. 28 and Feb. 8, 1918. The pupils were tested in groups in one 
of the regular school rooms and were so seated as to prevent copying. The timing 
was made by a stop-watch, and pains were taken scrupulously to adhere to the time 
limits. 

The grade classification was made by the special school teachers on the basis of 
the pupil's performance in the daily arithmetic work. Two hundred and thirty-three 
pupils (159 boys and 74 girls) were tested, while the enrollment on February 1 was 
272. Some pupils not tested were absent, but the majority who were not tested were 
reported by the classroom teachers to be incapable of doing the tests. They were 
rated as doing kindergarten or sub-kindergarten work. Only one pupil (case Twenty- 
eight) who classified lower than the first grade was given the exercises. She made 4, 
4 and 3 attempts in exercises A, B, and C, but failed completely on all. She was ten 
years old at the time and had been in school three and a half years. At the age of 9, 
she graded VI years by the 1908 and 5.6 (I. Q. 62) by the 1911 B.-S. scale, and about 
five and a half by the Seguin and was classified as a potential moron. On the other 
hand, one boy who graded 2.4 by B.-S. at the time of the B.-S. examination, one boy 
who graded 3.4, and four pupils who classified in the four year group were able to do 
some examples in some of the exercises. We shall give the records of the first two of 
these cases. 

Case Twenty-nine (an American, born in St. Louis) who graded 2.4 at the age of 
7.6 was of much higher intelligence than the B.-S. examination indicates. He was 
referred to the clinic because "he makes little progress in school." He has been in 
school one and three-fourths years, one and a half in the kindergarten, and at the age 
of seven and a half is unable to do P. He is good in handwork. He plays with boys 
like a normal boy. He is generally a normal child. His greatest trouble is in 
language and speech. The kindergarten teachers only got broken phrases from him. 
I suspect that the trouble is due to hearing. A brother finished the eighth grade and 
a sister is now (March, 1917) in the sixth grade, both rather poor pupils. 

The history indicates that he was born on time, the third child, the father being 
38 and the mother 26 at the time of birth, neither addicted to drink, while the family 
history was reported negative. He had chicken pox at 2 years, measles at 3, and 
whooping cough at 4. There was little delay in early development except in speech 
and dentition. First dentition was at 13 months, he sat at 6, stood, took his first steps and 
walked at 14 months, used single words at 2 years, but did not use short phrases until he 
was 7 years. He had made use of the sign language. Examined at a hospital he was 
said to be "all right," while at a later examination in a medical school clinic he was 
pronounced "all right, but slow." The school medical examiner reported "that he had 
a slight tremor of the tongue, that he could not raise the tip over the lip, that he does 
not seem to be able to speak, but nods the head and makes a few sounds when asked to 
speak, that he cannot hear ordinary sounds and is a deaf-mute." The writer's 
examination disclosed tremors of the fingers and tongue, but in neither case were they 
pronounced. He was able to move his tongue fairly well in all directions. He respond- 

64 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 65 

ed to the Rinne and the ordinary fork test. His mother said that he could hear, as he 
would come down stairs when called from the first floor, under conditions precluding 
the possibility of Hp reading. During our Binet examination (age 7.6) it was evident 
that the boy was watching our lips and facial expressions. Nevertheless we reached 
the conclusion that although partially deaf he could hear but that he failed to under- 
stand some of the words which he could hear. We felt quite certain that he heard 
our voice but did not always comprehend the words, and that he was unable to express 
himself in words. He imitated gestures readily, repeated two digits from memory, 
but when three numbers were used he responded before the experimenter got through'. 
"It is cold and snowing" was reproduced as, "cold and snow." "My dog's name is 
Fido," was given as "Dog's name is Fido," and "In summer it is warm," became 
"um.mer it is warm." He counted four pennies (his mother said he could count to 
10), and named a penny and a nickel, but when asked what a key and a knife were he 
only made imitative movements. He was much interested in the pictures, but would 
not respond to the questions. He pointed twice to objects in one picture.' He would 
make no response when asked where his nose, eyes and mouth were. He failed on 
the 3- and 12- gram weight discrimination test and the test on the designation of the 
longer line, evidently because he did not understand the verbal instructions. He 
pointed to the right line twice and to the wrong line three times. He made no 
response to the question whether he was a boy or a girl. Asked emphatically if he 
was a girl, he merely shook his head. He did the Healy mare-and-foal form board in 
20 moves and 1 minute 35 seconds (seven mistakes), and the Seguin form board in 
17 seconds (best of three, one error), which is better than age nine according to the 
combined norms and equal to about eight years according to the writer's norms. A 
tentative diagnosis was made of impaired hearing, not amounting to deafness, asso- 
ciated with partial congenital motor aphasia, (inability to learn to speak because of 
a lesion in Broca's convolution), and partial congenital auditory aphasia, or, as it is 
also called, word-deafness, or sensory aphasia, or verbal amnesia (inability to under- 
stand heard words, because of a defect in the first temporo-sphenoidal lobe), the intel- 
ligence diagnosis being deferred. He was recommended for examination by' an expert 
otologist and for assignment to a school for pupils with speech and hearing defects, 
but, because of the impossibility of transferring him to this school, he was assigned to 
a special class for mental defectives. The recommendation that he should have his 
ears examined by an otologist was again made a year later, but without result. 

In March, 1918, we asked the principal of the adjoining elementary school to test 
the boy's ability to hear and comprehend spoken language. He reported that he 
"hears noises and spoken words, but he does not seem to apprehend spoken words 
well." Later in the month we asked his teacher to send us the results of a number of 
observations and tests. He had then received individual instructions for almost a 
year. The answers indicated that he could use about 70 words in conversation, but 
he speaks only in short phrases of two or three words {"play ball," "play marbles," 
"boy got ball, " "boy hit me. " "read to papa, ") and prefers to use gestures or signs. He 
properly named 24 objects from pictures, but could not name a leaf, towel, chair, teeth, 
hoe, hammer, frog, or sled (but he went through the motions of coasting). He is able 
to imitate spoken words fairly well, but says "dirl" for girl, "wun" for run, "chitty" 
for chicken, "tan" for can, "gween" for green. He has no trouble with p. b, d, l,p,s, t, 
and w, and is now able to get m, but the other consonants are difficult. His under- 
standing of spoken words seems to be limited, but he understands, among others, the 
following words and phrases: run, hop, jump, see, recess, boy, girl, kitty, sister, bird, baby, 
paper, pencil, catch, horse, chicken, play ball, come on, go home, get the ball, catch it, throw 
it. He properly executed the following verbal commands: "put the scissors in the 



66 Miami University 

drawer; "give me two books;" "bring five pieces of chalk;" "give me a pencil;" "put 
this basket on the piano." He reads poorly new matter from the primer, and writes 
primer work from dictation. He hears a moderate tone of voice when attentive. Other- 
wise he may not hear shouts. His hearing varies from day to day. 

In May, 1918, the writer gave him some tests in school. He pointed to and 
named in pictures a cat "tiity," hen "ticken," bird, girl "dirl," dog "Trip" and ball. 
He seemed to call a cow a "bird" but at the conclusion of the test it sounded more like 
"bull." Asked where the word ball occurred in a primer he pointed to "Ben." "Run, 
Ben, run" were read as "Run, ball, run." "Get the ball, Ben," produced the inarticulate 
reproduction of "the ball. " He read "This is a ball" correctly, although the word "this" 
was indistinct. He correctly read "See this dog." To the dictation, "the cat plays," he 
wrote: "the play." It was observed that he watched the experimenter's lips, hence the 
experimenter dictated "the dog runs" aloud in each of his ears several times, but he 
wrote nothing. After being allowed to look at the experimenter's lips he wrote: 
"scloled the." When the sentence, "I can play ball," was dictated in a loud voice near 
to his left ear, he wrote: "/ like play htll." Taking precautions that he should not read 
our lips, we asked him to write 5. He did nothing until shoWn the 5. He was then 
asked to write 10, then 8, then 6, and finally 1, but only wrote 6 for 10. Permitted to 
look at our face, he was asked in succession to write each of the following digits: 4, 7 
2, 10, 9, 8, 2. He wrote 14, 17, 12, and 10. Possibly some of his ones were intended to 
be strokes between the figures. When we dictated in succession. A, C, E, D, he wrote 
1, 8, 1, 6. When we dictated, O, I, he wrote nothing. After we had dictated "ball" 
several times without success, we showed him a ball, and he wrote "htll." We dictated 
"book" several times, and finally showed him a book, but he wrote nothing. He wrote 
"play" properly from dictation, and also "doll" when a doll was dictated and also 
shown. He wrote "sing" for the dictation, "see the doll." When told to write all the 
words he knew he only shrugged his shoulders. In the tests of hearing we found that 
he habitually tended to turn his eyes toward the speaker, but some at least, of the 
numbers spoken aloud at close range, were heard under conditions precluding lip 
reading. Judging by his general reaction we inferred that he was able to hear loud 
sounds at a distance of fifteen feet, but he only reproduced a couple of words 
correctly. He was told to go to the black board in a matter of fact way in fairly loud 
tones, and without the use of gestures, but he made no response except to mutter 
something that was unintelligible to the experimenter. 

In the spiral arithmetic exercises he did two examples in A and one in E, while he 
was not given Starch or Ayres spelling tests or the Gray oral reading test, because of 
reported incapacity in reading and spelling. 

In the June, 1918, report from the special school he was reported "poor" in the 
identification of sounds, "fair" in physical training, but "poor" in rhythm, "fair" in the 
use of tools in wood work, and "fair" in drawing, but "poor" in raffia, stitched 
basketry, spelling and reading, though he had made some progress in all, he has made 
slight improvement in articulation and marked improvement in writing, and he 
observes fairly well but his attention wavers. His conduct is good and his best results 
are in handwork. The most significant improvement, noted in the June, 1919, report, 
is in the accuracy of his wood work. He has developed better form in drawing and 
writing, in which he was given a second grade and first quarter rating. In reading he 
was rated 1-4, in writing from dictation 1-2 (no improvement), in oral and vmtten 
spelling 1-3, in arithmetic 1-3, while in naming objects in the room and in pictures, he 
was poor, having shown little improvement. He had shown a little improvement in 
enunciation as a result of articulation drills. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 67 

In December, 1919, we secured an examination of the boy by Dr. Louis K. Guggen- 
heim, an expert otologist, who found a sHght retraction of the drum membranes, 
irritation of the muco-cutaneous junction of the anterior nares, and adenoids which 
did not obstruct sufficiently to require an operation. The hearing was considered to 
be fair. Dr. Guggenheim also believes that the boy suffers from an undeveloped audi- 
tory verbal center (Wernicke's center). After having studied this boy for several years, 
we are satisfied that he is subnormal in general intelligence and subject to a consider- 
able degree of word-deafness. But the subnormality does not amount to imbecility. 
Many word-deaf cases appear like idiots or imbeciles; perhaps most are mistaken for 
imbeciles. Burr believes that the "wild children" recorded in the past were strayed 
aphasics. 

In the majority of Starr's fifty cases of word-deafness, as in our case, the power 
to name objects or to talk coherently was impaired, indicating that speech proceeds 
from auditory cues in many individuals. It is possible that there might be no impair- 
ment of speech from a defective hearing center in the case of individuals whose 
articulation proceeds from ideas of the appearance of objects or of their printed names, 
instead of from auditory images. Such persons will not be aphasic but mentally deaf: 
they will find it difficult to understand speech. 

Arno MuUer reports three subjects with apparent agraphia (inabihty to learn to 
write because of lesion in the left middle frontal gyrus, or in a sensory area, e. g., 
Wernicke's sensory area, which furnishes the cue for writing movements) all of whom 
were found to be hard of hearing. All responded, although slowly, to the ear treat- 
ment prescribed. When the hearing is poor it is probable that the pathways between 
the acoustic-visual speech and writing centers are impaired. Impairment of hearing 
would probably interfere with the proper storing of auditory images, and of the con- 
nection of the auditory images with the visual and motor (reading and writing). In 
the case of suspected auditory aphasia and dictation agraphia (inability to write from 
dictation) we should look to the subject's hearing and remedy, if possible, any defects 
found. 

The pedagogy of word-deafness, because of its infrequency, has not been worked 
out in great detail. In general, to educate the auditory centers we must resort mainly 
to articulation drills and lip-reading. Once the word-deaf have been started on the 
right educational tract, many acquire lip-reading, reading and writing. They acquire 
this more easily than the understanding of spoken language. Word-deaf cases, 
however, probably improve less (at least so far as the understanding of speech is 
concerned) than word-blind or agraphia cases, according to the opinion of Kerr. 

Case Thirty, who graded 3.4 by the 1908 and 4.2 by the 1911 B.-S. scale at the age 
of 9.4, had very defective speech and hearing. It was difficult to test him by the B.-S. 
both because of this and because of his reticence and refusal to respond. In the Seguin 
form board he graded about seven and a half years by the combined norms and less 
than seven by the writer's norms. It was our judgment that the form board record 
located his intelligence level more correctly than the B.-S. record. The diagnosis was 
deferred, although it was felt that he was probably feeble-minded through an attack 
of meningitis at the age of one year. He did not learn to talk until two years after 
this attack. In the special school he was very phlegmatic and reticent at first. In the 
June, 1918, report at the age of 12 he was rated as doing second grade first quarter 
work in drawing and writing, first grade fourth quarter in reading and spelling and 
second grade first quarter in arithmetic and was said to have made the greatest 
progress in industrial work. In the spiral arithmetic tests in 1918, when he was almost 
12 years old, he did 8 examples in A (addition), 6 in B (subtraction), 3 in D (division), 
2 in E (addition) and 3 in F (subtraction). In the latter test he did as well as the 



68 Miami University 

normal third grade pupils. It is impossible to rate him in the other tests because of 
the inadequacy of the norms. He made no score in the Gray reading test, spelled 
seven words in Starch II and none in I, and 2, 4, 7, 9, and 13 words in Ayres A to E, 
respectively. The school record indicates that he is mentally defective, but he 
certainly is of higher intelligence than the B.-S. age would indicate. 



THE RELATION OF ARITHMETICAL ACHIEVEMENT TO 
ASCENDING GRADE, B.-S. AGE AND DIAGNOSIS 

The analysis will be confined to the average number of rights ( and the medium 
number when given) for the two sexes combined. 

There is a very patent increase, Table XX, from grade to grade, in all the exercises 
without exception, from A to G; and also in J, addition of 13 1-place digits; in K, 
division of two digits into three or four digits in L, multiplication of four digits by 
two digits; and in M, addition of five 4-place digits. 

Owing to the number of exercises it would require too much space to give the 
amount of improvement from grade to grade. The figures from which such a com- 
putation can be made are available in the table. We shall, however, give the percent- 
age of improvement for some of the exercises in the section in which the results are 
compared with the normal pupils. 

The problems in fractions (H and O), even those requiring no change of denom- 
inator, were entirely too difficult for these pupils. The average number of examples 
solved by the whole group was only .05 in H and .01 in O. In fact only one boy (in 
the third grade) did any examples in H and only one boy in O (in the fourth grade). 
The boy who did fractions in O (dyslexia case, number Eleven) curiously failed entirely 
on the fractions in H. The record shows that he was able to divide and multiply 
fractions in O, but could not add or subtract fractions. The examples in H are in the 
addition and subtraction of fractions. 

In I, division of one digit into five digits, and in N, division of two digits into five 
digits, there is an insignificant increase except in grade IV, although the fourth grade 
pupils attempted more examples than the pupils in any of the other grades. These 
tests, however, proved too difficult for these pupils. Only three pupils solved any 
examples in N, and only 19 in I. 

As shown in Table XX, the amount of time in school, the chronological age at the 
time of the arithmetic test, and the intelligence age at the time of the B.-S. examination 
increase slightly from grade to grade, except that the length of schooling is the same 
for the second and third grade pupils. The difference in the intelligence age from 
grade to grade amounts to almost exactly one year, thus almost precisely paralleling 
the assumed difference in normal chronological ages between the grades. 

The medians. Table XXI, are usually lower than the averages. Out of 60 possible 
comparisons between the medians and averages in the corresponding exercises in the 
same grade, the medians are lower in 41, higher in 11 and equal in 8 instances. The 
medians are zero in all the exercises in the first grade except A; in all the exercises in 
the second grade except A to E and G; in exercises H, I, K, L, N, and O of the third 
grade; and in exercises H, I, N, and O of the fourth grade. 

The increase in the median scores in the different exercises from grade to grade 
occurs with only one exception, if we disregarded the instances in which the scores 
are zero and therefore equal. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



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Miami University 



TABLE XXI 
NUMBER OF RIGHTS IN ARITHMETIC EXERCISES (MEDIANS) ACCORDING TO GRADE 



Sex 



A 


B 


C 


D 


E 


F 


G 


H 


I 


J 


K 


L 


M 


N 


4.5 





.5 











n 























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8 


4 


3 


2 


2 





1 























7 


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2 


1 


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3 


2 


1 





1 























11 


8 


5 


4 


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1 


1 








2 








1 





8 


4 


4 


3 


3 





1 





n 


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10 


7 


5 


4 


3 


1 


1 








2 








1 





25 


15 


13 


15 


4 


6 


3 








3 


4 


2 


3 






Grade I- 
Boys . . . 
Girls... 
Both . . . 

Grade II. 
Boys... 
Girls... 
Both... 

Grade III 
Boys .. 
Girls... 
Both... 

Grade IV 
Boys... 



It is evident, however, from the large number of zero scores that all of the exercises 
except the first five or six are too difficult to make it possible to measure improvement 
from grade to grade among these pupils by means of the medians. 

We have already pointed out that the pupils who graded in the II- and Ill-year B.- 
S. classification, in Table XXII, actually rated higher in intelligence than indicated by 
the B.-S. age. In analyzing the data in this table we shall ignore these two ages. 

Only one pupil, a X-year old boy, classified as very backward or borderline in in- 
telligence, who was subject to dyslexia (number Eleven, discussed in the section on 
spelling), solved any of the examples in O, fractions. In H, addition and subtraction 
of fractions, only one boy, in age VIII, made any score. 

Only 3 boys in age VII, 6 in VIII, 2 in IX and one in X, and one girl in VIII (13 
pupils,) made any score in K, division of 3 or 4 digits by 2 digits. In I, the division 5 
digits by one digit, presumably somewhat easier, scores were made by only one boy 
each in V and VII, 9 boys and 2 girls in VIII and 2 boys and 1 girl in IX (16 pupils). 
In N, division of five digits by two digits, only one boy and one girl in age VII and one 
boy in age VIII made a single score. It is even more apparent from the clinic group 
that the fraction and division examples were entirely too difficult. 

In G, multiplication of four digits by one digit, no examples were solved in any age 
under VII, except by one boy in V and 3 boys in VI. In VII, ten boys and girls each 
succeeded, while above VII 35 boys and 5 girls solved examples. In L, multiplication of 
4 digits by 2 digits, only one Vll-year old girl made a score, while only 9 boys and 2 girls 
above VII suceeded. The number of attempts shows that many worked the problems 
incorrectly; some did not finish a single problem, while others gave no indication of 
having done anything. The same explanation applies to all of the other difficult tests. 

In J, addition of 13 1-place digits, which requires a considerable attention span, 
only 5 boys in VI did any examples. The number of boys who did examples in ages 
VII to X was 9, 23, 5 and 1 respectively, and the number of girls from VII to IX, 5,6 
and one (or 50 altogether). In M, addition of five 4-place digits, which involves carry- 
ing, only one boy in VI succeeded. The number who succeeded from VII to X among 
the boys is 4, 21, 5, and one, respectively, and among the girls from VII to IX, 3, 4 and 
one (or 39 altogether). Many pupils started but did not get time to finish one of these 
examples. 



The Achievement op Subnormal Children 



71 



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10.98 
11. 25 
n 06 




•ON 


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01 o 

< 


< 


Age IV 
Boys . 
Girls .. 
Both .. 


Age V 
Boys . . 
Girls . . 
Both .. 


Age VI 
Boys 
Girls . 
Both .. 


Age VII 
Boys .. 
Girls .. 
Both .. 


Age VIII 
Boys .. 
Girls .. 
Both .. 


Age IX 
Boys 
Girls .. 
Both 


Xm 


5 M MX 

ScQOff 

a 





72 



HiAMi Uniyessity 



In F, subtraction of 3 digits from 3 or 4 digits, not one pupil worked a single 
example under age VII. The number of boys who solved examples in ages VII to X 
was 6, 23, 3 and one, respectively, and the number of girls from VII to IX, 5, 4 and 1, 
respectively. In all of the difficult tests the average score made is very small. 

If we compare the score made in a given exercise in the different B.-S ages, we 
find that there is a uniform improvement with rising B.-S. age in only two exercises, 
C, multiplication of a 1-place by a 1-place figure, and G, multiplication of 4 digits by 
one digit (we are not considering ages II and III). The improvement, however, is 
fairly uniform in exercises A, B, D, and E. In three tests, H, N and O, there are 
more losses and equal scores than gains. In all cases where the scores are equal the 
pupils failed completely in the test. In two tests, B, subtraction and J, addition, there 
is improvement in five ascending ages and a loss in one. In tests F and K there were 
four gains and two equal scores; in A, D, E and I, four gains and two losses; in M, 
four gains, one loss and one equal; and in L, three gains, one loss and two equal. It is 
evident that the tendency to improve with increasing intelligence age among our 
mental defectives varies greatly for the different tests, but the gains are more frequent 
than the losses or the equal scores in all tests except H, L, N and O. 

When the results are summated for all the exercises we find 56 instances of improve- 
ment from age to age, as against 16 losses and 18 equal scores. The chronological age 
of the pupils increases, although irregularly, with increasing B.-S. age, while the amount 
of time spent in school increases without exception with each higher intelligence age. 

It may also be readilj'^ inferred from what we have said that the amount of gain or 
loss between successive mental ages is sometimes quite negligible. For the first four 
tests, however, the amount of improvement between successive ages is very patent. 
This is shown by the following indices of improvement, obtained by dividing the score 
made in a test in one age into the score made in the same test in the next higher age: 



Ages 



IV 



VI 



VII 



VI 



VIII 



VII 



IX 



VIII 



Test A: 

Index 
Test B: 

Index 
Test C: 

Index 
Test D: 

Index- 



■ 94 
133 
1.20 

46 



1.17 
1 45 
3 76 
1.50 



1 51 
2.05 
2.03 
5.8 



1.34 
1.95 
1 95 
1.71 



1.98 
2 22 
2 54 
2 79 



There are only two losses, and these are immaterial because of the limited 
number of subjects. The gains range from 17% to 480%, the median among the 18 
indices amounting to 95%. The largest per cents of improvement are made from age 
VI to VII and from age VIII to IX. The gains are somewhat larger in lists B, C, and 
D than in A. 

In considering the classification of the data according to the diagnosis. Table XXIII, 
we shall disregard the "deferred" category, for reasons given in connection with the 
reading test, and the normal category, which contains only one subject, the epileptic 
girl who was described in the section on the oral reading test (case Twenty-three) 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 



73 



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Girls 4102 
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Boys 38 
Girls 6 
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Backward 


Boys 7 
Girls 3 
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Normal 








MOW 



74 



Miami University 



Comparing the scores in the same exercise in the different categories, we find 47 
instances in which there is improvement with rising inteUigence classification, 15 
instances in which the scores are equal, usually because of complete failures, and 13 
instances in which there are losses. Eight of the failures to show improvement or losses 
occur among the potential morons as compared with the imbeciles, and eleven among the 
potential feeble-minded as compared with the morons. The reason the potential morons 
did so poorly is probably due to the fact that while they rated a quarter of a year higher 
in general intelligence, they were about a year younger and had been in school over a 
third of a year less than the imbeciles. The reason the potential feeble-minded did 
poorer than the morons is similar. Although their intelligence level is the same they 
averaged 1.65 years younger, and had been in school a year less than the morons. 

Disregarding the potential morons and potential feeble-minded, there are only 4 
esses and 4 equal scores (all failures except one) as compared with 37 gains. The 
increase in B.-S. and chronological age and in length of time in school with rising 
intelligence classification is uniform among these four categories, except in the back- 
ward classification compared with the borderline. The backward averaged about the 
same in chronological and mental age but had been half a year less in school. This may 
explain why half of the failures to show gains are among the backward cases. 

While there is thus a very distinct improvement shown with ascending intelligence 
category, the amount of the improvement is not always large, particularly in the most 
difficult tests. In the four simplest tests the improvement is sometimes quite marked, 
as shown by the following indices of improvement, obtained by dividing the score found 
in a test in one category of intelligence into the score in the next higher category: 





Moron 


Borderline 


sBorderline 


Category 


Imbecile 


Moron 


Backward 


Test A: 


3.14 
6.80 
10.8 


1.36 
185 
1.93 
1.11 


1 02 


Test B: 


1 13 


Teste: 

Index 

Test D: 


.99 
1 17 









The improvement cannot be computed in test D between the imbeciles and the 
morons because the imbeciles did not score. In only one instance is there a loss. The 
mprovement varies from 2% to 930%. It is largest between the imbeciles and morons; 
and smallest between the borderline and backward, probably for the reason already ad- 
vanced. In the fraction examples only one borderline pupil in H and only one back- 
ward pupil in O out of the entire number tested did any examples. No one classified 
as feeble-minded could do any test in fractions. 

In N, division of two digits into five digits, only one boy each among the morons, 
borderline and backward made any scores. In H, division of two digits into 3 or 4 digits, 
only two moron boys, four borderline boys and one borderline girl, and 6 backward 
boys did any examples. In I, division of one digit into five digits, only one imbecile 
boy, one moron boy, one potential feeble-minded boy, 8 borderline boys and 2 border- 
line girls, and 2 backward boys, and 1 backward girl, or 16 out of the 178 pupils did 
any examples. In D, division of one digit into one or two digits, 2 potential-moron boys» 
13 moron boys and 11 moron girls, 12 potential feeble-minded boys and 4 potential 
feeble-minded girls, 26 borderline boys and 3 borderline girls, 16 backward boys and 2 
backward girls, and 2 deferred boys and 1 deferred girl, and the one normal girl did 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 75 

any examples, or a total of 93 pupils. Clearly all the division tests were too difficult 
for the feeble-minded. Less than half of the morons w^ere able to get any examples 
right in the easiest set, D. In fact, only in the latter test were a considerable prepon- 
derance of the backward and borderline able to score, although they averaged over 
twelve years of age and had been in school over five years. 

In the subtraction tests the following number of pupils did examples: in test B, 
one digit from one digit or from two digits, imbeciles, 2 boys and one girl; potential 
morons, 2 boys; morons, 19 boys and 16 girls; potential feeble-minded, 15 boys and 5 
girls; borderline, 33 boys and 6 girls; backward, 15 boys and 2 girls; deferred, 3 boys 
and 3 girls; and normal 1 girl, or a total of 123; in test, F, 3 digits from 3 or 4 digits, 
morons, 7 boys and 5 girls; potential feeble-minded, 4 boys; borderline, 14 boys and 4 
girls; backward, 8 boys and 1 girl; deferred, 1 boy, or a total of 44. Obviously the 
more difficult subtraction examples, F, are too difficult for our highest grade of feeble- 
minded. Most of the morons, however, were able to do at least one example in the 
simpler set. A large preponderance of the borderline, potential feeble-minded and 
backward were able to score in the latter set. 

In the multiplication tests the following number of pupils made some score: in 
test C, multiplication of one digit by one digit, imbeciles; one boy and one girl; potential 
morons, two boys; morons, 19 boys and 16 girls; potential feeble-minded, 16 boys and 
5 girls; borderline, 32 boys and 5 girls; backward, 15 boys and 3 girls; deferred, 5 boys 
and 2 girls; and normal, one girl (123 pupils); in test G, potential morons, one boy; 
morons, 10 boys and 9 girls; potential feeble-minded, 10 boys and 1 girl; borderline, 
18 boys and 3 girls; backward, 9 boys; deferred, 1 boy; and normal, 1 girl (63 pupils); 
and in test L, morons, 1 girl; potential feeble-minded, 1 boy; borderline, 5 boys and 1 
girl; and backward, 3 boys and 1 girl (12 pupils). Only the simplest of the multiplica- 
tion tests comes within the possibility of the majority of our highest grade mental 
defectives (morons), or a considerable preponderance of the potential feeble-minded, 
borderline or backward. 

In the addition tests, the number making any scores was as follows; in test M, 
addition of five 4-pIace digits, potential morons, 1 boy; morons, 6 boys and 3 girls; 
potential feeble-minded, 2 boys and 3 girls; borderline, 14 boys and 1 girl; backward 3 
boys and 1 girl; and deferred, 1 boy (or 40 pupils); in test J, addition of 13 1-place 
digits, potential morons, 2 boys; morons, 6 boys and 6 girls; potential feeble-minded, 7 
boys and 3 girls; borderline, 17 boys and 1 girl; backward, 10 boys and 2 girls; and 
deferred, 1 boy (or 55); in test E, imbeciles, 2 boys; potential morons, 2 boys; morons, 
21 boys and 15 girls; potential feeble-minded, 13 boys and 6 girls; borderline, 28 boys 
and 6 girls; backward, 16 boys and 2 girls; deferred, 4 boys and 2 girls; and normal, 1 
girl (or 120). In test A, addition of two 1-place digits, all the pupils did one or more 
examples except 3 imbeciles, 1 potential moron, 1 potential feeble-minded and 2 
borderline. The simplest addition test was the only test in which the majority of the 
imbeciles were able to make a score. It was decidedly the easiest test in the entire 
series. Only in tests A and E, however, was it possible for the majority of the 
potential morons, morons, and borderline to score. A majority of the backward also 
scored in J. 

The imbeciles scored only in exercises A, B, C, E, and I, the easiest exercises in 
addition, subtraction, and multiplication, and the more difficult exercise in division, 
while the imbeciles were the only ones to fail entirely in M, addition of 5 4-place digits, 
which involves carrying; J, addition of 13 1-place digits, which requires a considerable 
attention span; G, multiplication of 4 digits by one digit; and D, the division of one 
digit into one or two digits. In J, 25 random attempts were made by two girls. Four 



76 Miami University 

of the 13 imbeciles failed completely in all exercises, while 6 failed in all except one 
Only one imbecile scored in as many as four exercises. It is evident that arithmetical 
work was beyond our mental defectives of the grade of imbeciles, who average 11.8 
years of age and had been in school about four years, with the exception of the 
simplest .exercises in addition. 

SEX DIFFERENCES 

There are more instances in which the boys' scores surpass the girls' scores than 
the reverse. In the grade classification the boys excel in 24 comparisons, the girls in 
10, while the scores are equal in 11 of the 45 possible comparisons in grades I, II and 
III. In the general averages for all the boys and girls, the boys are superior in 14 
exercises while the scores are equal in one exercise. In the B.-S. classification the 
boys excel in 31, the girls in 20, while the scores are equal in 39 of the 90 comparisons 
in ages IV to IX. In the general averages for the entire group, the boys excel in 14 
exercises while the scores are equal in one. In the diagnosis classification, including 
all categories in which comparison can be made, the boys excel in 47 instances, the 
girls in 22, while the scores are equal in 36. The large number of equal scores is due 
to the large number who failed completely in the tests. While the differences between 
the scores of the boys and the girls are frequently trifling, yet the tendency of the boys 
to excel is sufficiently marked to be noticeable. The girls in these exercises are 
perhaps relatively weakest in division (I and J) and fractions (H and O). 
Unfortunately there are no figures available for these arithmetic exercises which make 
it possible to compare our results with the boys and girls in the regular grades in the 
St. Louis schools. 

VARIABILITY 

The analysis of the variability will be limited to pointing out the quartile deviation 
(Q) and range (R), based on the combined figures for the two sexes, in the grade 
classification. 

It is evident from the detailed analyses which have preceded that both the quartile 
deviation and the range will be zero in some of these tests, especially in the lower grades, 
because they were entirely too difficult for all the pupils. Inspection of Table XXIV 
shows that some one in every grade failed in every test with the exception of tests B 
and C in grade III, and tests A to E, and J and M in grade IV. 

If we confine our analysis to the four easiest examples, we find that the range is 
the greatest in test A, and that it decreases gradually from A to D, except in grade IV. 
It is natural that the range should decrease as the type of example grows more difficult 
when the lowest scores in every classification are zero or one, as is the case in the 
first three grades, because the more difficult the tests grows the smaller will be the 
highest scores. This, therefore, seems to indicate that the tests are properly arranged 
in the order of difficulty. The greatest range in all four exercises is in the second 
and third grades. In exercise A it amounts to 26 and 25 examples in these grades 

The most serviceable measure by which to estimate the amount of variability is 
the relative quartile deviation, which we obtain by dividing the central tendency 
( average) into the Q obtained from the same set of measurements. The following are 
the Q's in terms of per cents of the averages: 



Grade 



III 



Test A. 
Test B . 
Test C 
Test D 



.00 



.42 
.40 
.54 
.40 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 

a 



77 



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2Baa«3 goa 



78 Miami University 

The variability seems to be abnormally large. With one exception, the lowest 
variability is 36% of the average, while the highest is 86%. It is probable that 
the variability is considerably greater among mental defectives classified in the same 
grade than among pupils in the elementary schools classified in the same grade, but 
we shall not know definitely whether this is true until we have comparable data from 
the regular grades. Counts* has given the distribution of the scores for some of the 
tests, but all the figures except for one test appertain to pupils above the third grade 
and cannot be compared with our data. 

There is a large number of very poor records, considering the subjects' level of 
intelligence, and a few rather superior records, although perhaps only one pupil can 
be said to have made a distinctly good record. The necessity for brevity makes it 
impossible for us to attempt anything like a detailed analysis of the records of these 
outstanding pupils. We shall refer merely to a few of those with the best and poorest 
records. 

Eight pupils, varying by the B.-S. test from 7.8 to 9.8 years, did from 51 to 123 
examples in all of the series. We shall resume briefly the. record of the best pupil, 
because he represents a type of child who, on the basis of a standard of diagnosis once 
widely followed, has generally been assigned as mentally defective to a special school, 
and the records of three pupils who would clearly be "morons" on the basis of the 
standards widely advocated and followed in connection with the Stanford revision. 
We shall in each case give the designation of the arithmetic test by letter, the score in 
Arabic numerals and the normal grade equivalent in Roman numerals. A minus sign 
in front of the latter indicates that the score is somewhat lower than the grade indicated, 
and a plus sign that it is somewhat higher. Grades less than IIP can only be given 
as — IIP, owing to the absence of norms below IIP. 

Case Thirty made the following record in the arithmetic exercises at the age of 
15.8: A, 27, —VIP; B, 26, —VHP; C, 19, VIP, D, 17, +1^; E, 7, — VP; F, 8, VP; G, 3, 
+IIP; H, O; I, 1, —IIP; J, 3, IIP; K, 4, IV^; L, 3, — V^; M, 4 ,— VP; N, O,; and 0,o. He 
failed in the tests on fractions and the difficult divison test. In 3 tests he did only 
about third grade work, while in the remaining 9 tests he graded from fourth to eighth 
grade. In fact, he did from fifth to eighth grade work in almost half of the tests. In 
the Gray Oral reading test he made 57.5, based on fourth grade classification, which is 
higher than the raw scores in any of the elementary grades. He did not take the 
spelling tests. The last report from the special school, made in June, 1918, after he 
had been in the school two and a quarter years, indicated that he did fifth grade work 
in reading, and fourth grade work in spelling and arithmetic. In the latter he was 
"usually alert and accurate, but sometimes surprisingly stupid in problems." 

At the time of the examination in the Clinic (December, 1915,) when he was 13.4 
years old he graded 9.8 years by the 1908 scale, and 9.6 by the 1911 (I.Q. 71) and 12 
years by the Seguin form board according to the combined norms and 11.4 according 
to the writer's norms. His percentiles were as follows: standing and sitting height, — 5 
and ^0; weight, 0; spirometry, 0; and right and left grip, and — 5. He was clearly under 
par physically. He was anemic and his tonsils were enlarged. A diagnosis of mental 
backwardness was made and he was recommended to an open air school. He was 
returned from this school, because his parents refused to pay for his lunch, to the 
grade school in March the following year, from which the request was made that he 
be sent to a special school because he did "not concentrate, and he was very nervous 
and troublesome." He was transferred to such a school solely because no ungraded 
class was available. The three annual reports which we have received from the 

♦As before, 36f . 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 79 

special school have indicated that it would be advisable to give him the advantages of 
instruction in an ungraded class. It is important that ungraded classes, from which 
the feeble-minded are exluded, should be provided for pupils with the degree of 
intelligence possessed by this boy. They will necessarily be hampered in classes 
designed for mental defectives. Based on the results of the testing of a considerable 
number of subjects by both the Stanford and the old B.-S. scales, this boy would have 
graded lower by the Stanford scale, and according to the theoretically established 
Stanford norms he would have been "definitely feeble-minded." His two teachers in 
the special schools agree with the writer that he is not feeble-minded. Considering 
his degree of backwardness as measured by the B.-S. scale, he possesses considerable 
ability in both reading and arithmetic. 

The three following subjects who were tested by the Stanford scale fell unequivocally 
below the line of "definite feeble-mindedness" by the Stanford scale and formula. On 
the basis of the low Stanford rating we classified the first pupil as a potential moron, 
the second as a moron, and the third as probably a moron. Had they been examined 
by the old scales, with which we had a much longer familiarity, and in the use of which 
we had learned to make various allowances in making intelligence diagnoses, we should 
probably have classified them as borderline. Such a classification, from the standpoint 
of the attempt to cautiously differentiate the grades of intelligence more sharply, 
would perhaps have been more in harmony with the pedagogical records of these 
pupils. 

Case Thirty-one, at the age of 13 years, made the following record in the arithmetic 
exercises: A, 19, -IV^; B, 20, Y*; C, 13,-IV2; D, 12, IIP; E, 8,-VIIP; F, 2,-IIP; G. 3 
—IIP; H, 0; I, 1,— IIP; J, 3,— IV^; K, 0, L, I,— IV^; M, 3,— IV^; N, 0; and O, 0. He com- 
pletely failed in the fraction and difficult division tests. In four tests he did third 
grade or slightly less than third grade work, while in seven tests he graded from 
about fourth grade to eight grade. In the Ayres spelling test he did between third 
and fourth grade work in I, and in L and O somewhat less than third grade. In the 
Gray reading test he scored 37.5, based on third grade classification, which is only 
equal to grade one. Had he been classified as of first grade, the score would have 
been considerably higher. However, he did better in arithmetic than in reading or 
spelling. 

This boy came from Detroit, Michigan, and because of his prior classification was 
placed in a IV^ class, but was unable to do the work. At the age of 12.58 he graded 
8.5 by the Stanford (I. Q. 67) and 10.5 years by the Seguin form board according to the 
combined norms and 9.5 according to the writer's. Physically he was suffering from 
post-nasal obstruction and dental caries. His head was of the sugar loaf type, with a 
high forehead. After five months in the special school the report indicated that he 
was "very good" in physical culture, wood, brush, concrete and clay work and cobbling. 
He was graded IIP in all the literary branches. In arithmetic he was "very good in 
abstract work." His greatest improvement was in arithmetic. He made "great effort," 
and his conduct was "excellent." On the basis of the special school record and the 
higher intelligence rating which he undoubtedly would have secured from the older B.- 
S. scales we should not classify him lower than the borderline. At the same time, his 
ability in arithmetic, as determined by the tests, is higher than his ability in reading 
or spelling. 

Case Thirty-two was referred to the Clinic from an ungraded class and from a 
class for troublesome boys to which he had been transferred before he could be 
examined. The complaint indicated that he was "unstable, erratic, untruthful, 
irresponsible, quarrelsome, cowardly, cruel, truant, covetous, and a consistent liar," 
although cheerful withal. He did first grade work in reading, between third and 



80 Miami University 

fourth in arithmetic, and was very poor in spelling. In March, 1918, at 13.16 years of 
age he graded 8.66 years by the Stanford (I. Q. 65) and 9.2 by the Seguin according to 
the combined norms and 7.7 by the writer's norms. He filled in all except two holes in 
the Healy-Fernald form board B in one minute, but could not fill in these two holes in 
two more minutes. He required 2 minutes to read to "city" in the Stanford selection 
(17 words), but received aid on 11 words and only read A, 5th, three, the, of. He read 
correctly, "/ am a boy," but "I can run" was read as "I am run." In the sentences "I 
can hop," "I can jump," "I can sing," he could only read the first two words. His 
spelling was abominable. He spelled foot as "fu," get as "ca;" for, as "form" and 
then "for;" horse as "hors;" cut, as "cu;" well, as "ye;" name as "men' and then 

"ment;" room, as "h ;" left as "fet," and with, as "went." He spelled dog 

and cat correctly. He was not equal to second grade spelling. On the physical side 
he was subject to rhinitis, enuresis, possibly adenoids, and slightly enlarged lymph 
glands. His expression was coarse, and his palate high. He fell from a pile of ties at 
the age of 3 years and received scalp wounds. His record showed that he had been 
disobedient and truant in the past, more or less queer, and subject to emotional 
outbreaks. 

In the special school he was reported to be sexually immoral, indifferent and 
quarrelsome, but made his greatest improvement in "disposition and interest." 

Although he had made little effort he was keen to observe. He was rated as 
barely doing first grade work in reading but third grade work in arithmetic. He only 
took the arithmetic tests, in which, at the age of 13.3, he scored as follows; A,12, — IIP; 
B, 11,— IIP; C, 10, IIP; D, 5,— IIP; E, 4,+IIP; F, 1,— IIP; G, 2,— IIP; H, o; I, o; J, 3, IIP; K, 3, 
— IV^; L, 0; M, 1,+IIP; N, 0; and O, 0. He failed in five of the tests, while in the others 
he graded from somewhat less than third grade to fourth grade. There is no question 
that he was better in arithmetic than in reading or spelling. This pupil's condition 
had been diagnosed as visual aphasia plus psychopathic constitution plus feeble- 
mindedness. There may be some doubt about this boy's being feeble-minded, but we 
would not grade him above borderline in intelligence. 

Case Thirty-three graded only 7.66 years by the Stanford scale in March, 1918, at 
the age of 13.16 and therefore seemed unquestionably feeble-minded according to the 
accepted standards (I.Q, 58). Further investigation showed, however, that, although 
born in St. Louis, she came from a home in which Italian was constantly spoken. Her 
English vocabulary, in spite of the fact that she had attended school five years (appar- 
ently public schools) was extremely meagre. She scored only 2520 in the Stanford 
vocabulary test. In the Seguin form board she graded distinctly higher, 11.2 by the 
combined norms and 10.4 by the writer's norms. She had been advanced in school to 
IIP, and was said to do IIP work. Her greatest defect was reported in language, and 
greatest interest in housekeeping. She was excellent in conduct. The principal adds 
that "these types do not get along in school, but they manage to get along fairly well 
out in life." The report from the special school two and a half months later indicated 
that she did IIP in writing, IP in reading, IP in oral and written language, IP in spell- 
ing and IIP in arithmetic. Her greatest ability was in manual work. She was of a 
very quiet disposition and good conduct. She was only given the arithmetic tests. 
Her scores at the age of 13.31 were: A, 14, IIP; B, 11,— IIP; C, 4,— IIP; D, 8,- IIP; E, 3,— IIP; 
F, 5,— IV2; G, 3,— IIP; H, o; I, o; J, 3, IIP; K, o; L, 2,— IV^; M, 3,— IV2; N, 1,— IV^; and O, o. 
She failed in three exercises. In all the others she varied from somewhat less than third 
grade to IV*. It is probably true, in harmony with the teacher's rating, that she has 
greater ability in arithmetic than in language, reading and spelling. Be this as it may 
we probably are not justified in definitely diagnosing a girl like this as a "moron," 



The Achievement op Subnormal Children 



81 



until we have found out how she is able to adjust herself to the demands of life out- 
side of the school during the period of the middle and later teens. 

Mental defectives have always been considered to be conspicuously deficient in 
arithmetic. We shall only cite one instance in which we might be justified in saying 
that there was a specific arithmetical defect, although it is superposed on a background 
of considerable general mental retardation. 

Case thirty-four, a very intelligent looking girl, but proving withal to be very 
apathetic, was examined in October, 1914, at the age of 10.16. By the 1908 she graded 
7.6 years and by the 1911, 6.8 (I. Q. 66). She was peculiarly stupid in the Seguin form 
board, being obliged to constantly scrutinize the blocks and recesses, and placing many 
of the blocks in the wrong recesses. In the third trial she made 20 moves in inserting 
the blocks. She graded less than four years in this test. She had been in school 4 
years, and advanced to the second grade. The mother said she was quick and bright 
and did not know there was anything wrong with her until she entered the kindergarten. 
Her tonsils wers enormously enlarged. In spite of all the unfavorable elements, we 
felt that she would eventually go somewhat above the feeble-minded status and diag- 
nosed her as borderline. We recommended the removal of the tonsils (which was not 
done until 1918) and assigned her to a special school. The first annual report, in June, 
1915, indicated that her greatest capacity was in reading (almost II grade), that she 
was poor in written language, writing, drawing, all forms of handwork and arithmetic. 
She had made her greatest improvement in physical training. The last report from 
the school, June, 1918, indicated that her greatest capacity was still in reading (third 
grade), followed by spelling, while she was very poor in arithmetic, having made no 
improvement and not doing over first grade work in telling time, measuring, counting 
money, and counting, reading and writing numbers. She had improved in the physical 
training work and in manual activities, but she did not do very good work in either. 
At the age of about 13 X years she did almost third grade work in Ayres I, between 
second and third in L, and considerably less than third in O. In the Starch columns 
her scores fell midway between the first and second grade standards. In the oral read- 
ing test she scored 32.5, based on a third grade classification, which is less than the 
third grade standard, or even the first grade standard. However, had she been given 
a lower classification she would have scored higher. In the arithmetic exercises she 
did only four examples in A, addition of one-place digits. The educational tests show 
not only that she is peculiarly deficient in arithmetic but that she does not grade as 
high in the standardized tests of reading and spelling as she had been rated in the 
school, and that she must be classed as mentally defective rather than borderline. 

COMPARISON OF THE RECORDS OF THE MENTALLY DEFECTIVE 
AND NORMAL PUPILS 

The following figures show the efficiency of the pupils in the special schools in 
terms of per cents of the efficiency of the pupils in the regular grades in the St. 
Louis schools. 



THE 


EFFICIENCY OF 
CENTS OF THE 


THE SPECIAL SCHOOL PUPILS EXPRESSED 
NORMAL EFFICIENCY, AS EXPLAINED ABC 


AS 
VE 


PER 






Test 


A 


B 


C 


D 


E 


F 


G 


H 


I 


J 


K 


L 


M 


N 


O 


Grade III 


.68 

L17 

.46 

.64 

.97 


.70 
88 
31 
.66 
! 06 


65 
.84 
32 
63 
1 08 


.44 
92 
23 
.43 
.80 


78 
.74 
.36 

66 
.85 


.43 

LO 
.20 
72 

1 


37 
58 
20 
37 
.52 


- 


.009 
.17 
6? 


1 

1.25 = 

76,1.0 

■ 35 X 

86' -^ 


.68 

X 

X 
X 


2.0 

90 

.64 

2 

119 


X 
X 




Grade IV 


- 






B.-S. Age IX 


77 


X 





A minus sign (— i indicates that the score for the special school pupils was zero and an X that 
it was zero for the grade pupils. An equality (= ) sign indicates that the scores were zero for both 
groups. 



82 Miami University 

The relative efficiency of the special school pupils is obtained by dividing the 
elementary school medians for grades IIP into the special school medians for the pupils 
classified as of grade III (Table XXI), the elementary medians for grade IV* into the 
special school medians for the pupils classified as of grade IV, the elementary medians 
for grade IIP into the averages (the medians not having been computed) for the 
morons and backward pupils (Table XXIII), and the elementary medians for grade IIP 
into the averages for age IX (Table XXII). As we have already pointed out the 
medians in the special schools are lower than the averages in the corresponding grades 
with only a few exceptions. 

It should be recalled that the tests in the elementary schools were given from two, 
to three months later in the year than the tests in the special schools, the conditions, 
therefore, being somewhat to the disadvantage of the special school pupils. 

Aside from the tests which were too difficult for both groups, the third grade 
special school pupils were equal to or surpassed the IIP normals in only two tests, 
addition of 13 one place digits, and addition of 5 four-place digits. The scores were 
small in both of these tests. In the other tests the efficiency of the special school pupils 
did not reach or exceed 70% of the normals' standard in more than two tests, 
subtraction of two one-place digits and addition of five one-place digits. The average 
age of the group at the time of the test was 13.7 and the average time in school 5.78 
years. They were, therefore, considerably older and had been much longer in school, 
than the normal IIP pupils. Seven of the pupils in this group who had been examined 
had been diagnosed as morons, 3 as potential feeble-minded, 12 as borderline and 6 as 
backward. Thirteen had not been examined. 

The fourth grade specials equaled the normal IV^. only in subtraction of a 3-place 
figure from a 3- or 4-place figure, and in the division of a 3-place figure into a 3- or 4-place 
figure, and they surpassed the normals only in addition of 2 one-place digits. In two 
other tests they made 90% of the normal score, namely in the division of a one-place 
figure into a one- or two-place figure and addition of 5 four-place digits. In tests H, I, 
N, and O, the specials failed entirely (according to the medians). The average age of 
the special group at the time of the test was 15.16 years and the average number of 
years in school 7.18. Two of the pupils had been diagnosed as very backward and one 
as borderline. 

It is evident that the subnormal pupils classified in the third and fourth grades in 
the special schools, of whom, however, the majority of those who had been examined 
had not been diagnosed as feeble-minded, are decidedly inferior in most of the exercises 
to the pupils in the regular IIP and IV* grades. The subnormal fourth grade pupils, 
however, were superior to the normal III"* pupils in ten exercises, inferior in four and 
equal in one. 

The morons did decidedly poorer than the IIP pupils in every test (disregarding 
tests K, L, N, and O, which were too hard for both group). The best score which they 
made in any test, addition of 5 four-place digits, was only 64% of the normal score. 
Their efficiency in seven of the tests varied from 20% to 36%. The absence of norms 
for grades I and II makes it impossible to express the status of the morons in accurate 
terms. The average age of the moron group at the time of the arithmetic test was 
13.16 and the average number of years in school was 5.67, while the average mental age 
at the time of the B.-S. examination was 7.38. Had the norms been available it is 
probable that the morons would not have done better than second grade work in the 
arithmetic tests. They would thus have required almost three years to do one year's 
work in arithmetic. 

Except in the exercises in which the scores are so small as to be negligible (K,L, 
N, and O) the backward pupils did decidedly poorer than the normal IIP. Their best 



The Achievement op Subnormal Children 83 

performance was in the addition of 13 one-place digits, 86% of normal IIP performance. 
In only three other tests did they equal or exceed 66% of normal IIP efficiency, namely 
in subtraction of 2 one-place digits, addition of 5 one-place digits, and subtraction of a 
three-place digit from a three or four-place digit. The group averaged 12.86 years at 
the time of the arithmetic test, 5.2 years in school and 8 years in intelligence. 

Of the mental age (B.-S.) categories we have selected the IX-year old group 
because, owing to the fact that there is only one X-year pupil (backward) they are 
the group with the highest mental level of the pupils who had been examined. The 
mental level at the time of the arithmetic test was, of course, somewhat higher, 
because some of the pupils were given the B.-S. tests a considerable time prior to the 
arithmetic test. Five of the IX-year olds had been classified as borderline, three as 
very backward and none as feeble-minded. As seen in Table XXII the IX-year olds 
did from two to three times better than the Vlll-year olds in nearly all the arithmetic 
exercises. 

The IX-year mentalities did better than the IIP in five tests, addition of 5 four- ^ 
place digits, multiplication of 2 one-place digits and of one 2-place digit by one 4-place 
digit, subtraction of 2 one-place digits, and division of a two-place figure into a three 
or four-place figure. In one exercise, subtraction of a three-place figure from a three 
or four-place figure, they did just as well, and in one exercise, addition of 2 one place 
digits, they did almost as well. Therefore they did as well or better than the normal 
III* in about half of the exercises. But they were considerably older and had been 
much longer in school. They averaged 13.25 years in chronological age at the time of 
the arithmetic test, and 6.58 years in school. 

In which processes did the special school pupils make the best records relatively 
to the normal standards? And in which processes did they make the poorest records? 
These questions can be best answered by arranging the percentages in the tabulation 
on p. 81 in the order of excellence in each grouping, namely in grades III and IV, 
morons, backward and B.-S. age IX. 

The special school pupils clearly made their best record, relatively to the 
performance of the normal pupils, in adding. The best record was made in test M, 
addition of five four-place digits in three of the groups in the tabulation on page 
81, whereas test J, addition of 13 one-place figures, was the second best in two groups, 
test E, addition of 5 one-place digits, was the third best exercise in two groups, while 
test A, addition of 2 one-place digits, was the best exercise in one group, the second 
best in one and the third best in one. 

The worst record in all groups was made in exercise H, the addition and subtrac- 
tion of fractions. The other fraction test, O, was too difficult for both the normal and 
the subnormal groups. Next in the order of difficulty comes the process of division. 
In test I, the division of a one-place figure into a five-place figure, the second poorest 
record was made in four of the groups and the third poorest in one of the groups. 
Test N, the division of a 2-place figure into a 5-place figure, was too difficult for both 
groups, and test K, the division of a 2-place figure into a 3 or 4-place figure, was al- 
most too difficult for each group. The easiest division test, D, the division of a 
1-place figure into a 1- or 2-place figure, came fourth in the order of difficulty in three 
groups and fifth in one group. 



84 



Miami University 



If we divide the normal IIP scores into general averages for all the examined 
pupils in Table XXIII, we obtain the following percentages: 



Test 


A 


B 


C 


D 


E 


F 


G 


H 


I 


J 


M 




.49 


.38 


.39 


.26 


1 
.39 9« 


.22 


.04 


.11 


.41 


.88 









No per cents can be computed for exercises K, L, N and O. The three best 
records of the subnormals are in addition tests, M, A, and J. The next best records 
are in the D multiplication and in the E addition exercises. The subnormals' poorest 
record is in fractions, H, followed by division, I. 

It is evident from our results that subnormal and feeble-minded children when 
compared with normal children, acquire their greatest proficiency in addition and leas 
proficiency in fractions, followed by division. This agrees with the conclusions 
generally reached respecting the mathematical ability of the feeble-minded, exept that 
we find that they are weakest in fractions, instead of division, as has been stated by 
others. 

In the following tabulation we give the indices of improvement in exercises A to 
F which the subnormal children made from grade I to grade II, from grade II to grade 
III, and from grade III to grade IV, based upon the figures in table XX; and the indicet 
of improvement made by the normal children from grade IIP to IV^. The indices are 
secured by dividing the score made in a given exercise in a given grade into the scors 
made in the next higher grade in the same exercise. 

INDICES OF IMPROVEMENT 



Exercises 


A 


B 


C 


D 


E 


F 


G 


Subnormal Group: 

Grade II/I. 

Grade III/II 

Grade IV/III 

Normal Group: 
Grade IV2/III2... 


2. 45 
1.13 
2.34 

135 


2 39 
1.99 
2.03 

172 


3.65 
1.32 

2. 77 

2.19 


5.23 
1.72 
2.67 

1.75 


2 85 
1.29 
1.93 

150 


5.61 
2 23 
2.76 

2 43 


6.46 
1.67 
163 

1 81 



The significance of the indices for our subnormal group is, unfortunately, impaired 
by the absence of data for the first and second grades among the normal children. 
We can only make a comparison between the subnormals and normals in grades III 
and IV, but here the results for the subnormal group are not very significant because 
of the few pupils in grade IV. However, the amount of improvement from the third 
grade to the fourth grade is very markedly greater for the subnormal group in all the 
exercises except one. The difference ranges from 18% to 99% in the different exer- 
cises. The average chronological age is 1.46 years higher for the fourth grade pupils 
than for the third grade pupils (i. e., for those who had been examined), the B.-S. age 
is 1.46 years higher, while the fourth grade pupils averaged 1.4 years longer in school. 
The above factors, together with the fact that none of the fourth grade pupils were 
feeble-minded, will probably explain why the special pupils improved relatively more 
than the normal fourth grade pupils. 

In the subnormal group the smallest gain was made from grade II to grade III, 
except in exercise G, multiplication of a 1 -place figure by a 4-place figure. The small 
difference here may be due to the fact that the third grade pupils averaged only a 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 85 

half year older, while they had not been any longer in school. They rated a year 
higher in intelligence. It is probably due to the higher intelligence rating that they 
did any better at all than the second grade pupils. The largest improvement in all 
the exercises was made from grade I to grade II. The large improvement between these 
grades is partly due to the fact that the second grade pupils averaged 1.2 years older 
chronologically and .99 year higher mentally (B.-S.) and had been 1.03 years longer in 
school. But since these differences are smaller than the corresponding differences 
between grade III and grade IV there must be some other factor or factors responsi- 
ble for the large improvement. Possibly were the data available for the normal 
grades we should find the same phenomenon obtaining there. The first grade pupils 
are busy gaining control of the mere tools of computation. After they have gained 
this control they are ready for a big advance, or spurt, as it were, in the second 
grade. This is probably one factor. But we surmise that our first grade scores are 
abnormally low because some pupils were included who should have been classified 
as sub-first or kindergarten. 

The greatest improvement in any exercise was in G, multiplication of a one-place 
figure by a 4-place figure, amounting to 546% between grades I and II, followed by 
461% in F, subtraction of a 3-place figure from a 3- or 4-place figure. 

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS 

In connection with this summary we shall relate the conclusions derived from the 
arithmetic test with the conclusions previously drawn from the spelling and reading 
tests. 
1 Subnormal children of the grade of imbeciles, or those grading IV- or V-years 
mentally or those classified as of kindergarten or first grade status are not 
able to function to any appreciable degree even in the simplest processes of 
arithmetic. The IV-year olds did not do a single example beyond E. One 
girl diagnosed as an imbecile failed on all exercises; an imbecile boy did two in 
A; a boy diagnosed as "deferred" did 6 in A and 1 in C, while a "deferred" 
girl did 12 in A, 8 in B, 3 in C and 2 in E. In the simple addition exercise (A) 
11 of the 13 V-year olds scored, while 5 scored in B and E, 3 in C, and only 
one in D, and one in G and I. The pupil who scored one in I, scored 1 in E, 
1 in B and 6 in A, and had been diagnosed as an imbecile. He was 11.3 years 
old at the time of the arithmetic test. The pupil who scored 1 in G, scored 3 
in D, 1 in B and 6 in A, was 12.16 years old, and graded 5.2 by the 1911 and 
5.6 by the 1908 at the age of 7.75, and was diagnosed as a potential moron. Of 
the V-year olds, 4 each had been diagnosed as imbeciles and potential morons, 
1 as potential feeble-minded, 1 as backward and 2 as deferred. One of the 
two who made the best record in test A had been diagnosed as a potential 
moron and the other one as deferred. Ten of the 13 imbeciles scored in A, 
only two doing over 3 examples, while in exercises B, C, E and I the number 
who scored was only 3, 2, 2 and 1, respectively. Six failed in all except one, 
while only one scored in as many as 4 exercises, doing 6 in A, 1 in B, 1 in E 
and 1 in I. He was 11.3 years at the time of the arithmetic test. He graded 
5.6 years by the 1911 scale and 6.4 by the 1908 at the age of 8.5. The aver- 
age age of the imbecile group at the time of the spelling test was 11.8 and the 
average number of years in school 4. Moreover, except in exercises A, B, C, 
D, E and G less than half of the subnormals classified as of first grade were 
able to score. Of the 17 who did any examples in F, G, I, J and M, ten had 
been examined. Of these five had been diagnosed as potential feeble-minded. 
By the B.-S. they graded 7.8, 6.6, 6.3, 7.6 and 8.8. Two were borderline, grad- 



86 Miami University . 

ing 6.8 and 7.8 by the B.-S. One was a moron, grading VIII years mentally; 
one an imbecile, grading 5.6 mentally; and one an epileptic, grading normal in 
intelligence when examined. 

It is evident that the arithmetic work proved to be too hard for the majority 
of the imbeciles, the V-year olds and the first grade pupils, and the conclusion 
suggested is that the teaching of arithmetic to imbeciles and mental defectives 
who have not reached a mentality of about six years does not result in the de- 
velopment of any useful form of skill. We reached the same conclusion re- 
garding reading, and the same conclusion probably applies to spelling, but 
since greater choice was exercised in the selection of the pupils in spelling we 
did not analyze the data as minutely as we did in the case of reading and arith- 
metic. 

Ideally the public schools should not be burdened with the instruction of low 
grade imbeciles of an intelligence level of three or four years or, in fact, 
any grade of imbeciles. But practically we are persuaded that at present 
imbeciles who have reached an intelligence level of four or five years should be 
admitted to the special classes in the public schools, not only because this is 
the age at which children may be admitted into the kindergarten in many states 
but, however meagre the results, something can be done for these children by 
prolonged and persistent training and unless the public schools assume this 
obligation the majority of these children will have to grow up without any 
school instruction, for many of the parents cannot afford to supply it privately, 
while the state schools cannot undertake the training of all of these children 
because of their overcrowded condition. Without training, these children will 
be far more of a burden and menace than with training. Moreover, it will be 
more economical for the public schools to undertake the training of these pupils, 
because the day schools will not have to bear the expense of clothing and feed- 
ing them. When the schools have finished their training they should be trans- 
ferred to farm or industrial colonies when not properly cared for at home, for 
custodial care and such employment as they can render. 

It goes without saying that the training given these low grade pupils in the 
public schools should be eminently practical. They should be trained in the 
proper care of their persons, in the control of their impulses, in self-help to 
others, and in the industrial pursuits in which they can be of service and 
helpfulness. 

Any literary instruction offered them should be designed merely to develop 
elementary concepts incidentally through the manipulation of concrete objects, 
e. g., the matching and arrangement of objects, forms, colors, beads, the repro- 
duction and construction of objects and shapes. In fact, many kindergarten 
and sensori-motor activities, plays and games will afford abundant opportunities 
for counting, adding to and taking away, noting magnitudes and observing the 
resemblances and differences incident to such operations. Similar types of ac- 
tivities with letter, word and number cards can be used for developing recog- 
nition of letter, number and word forms. 

With respect to mental defectives above this grade, defectives commonly re- 
ferred to as high grade imbeciles and morons (the latter of whom develop to 
about the nine-year level) we are convinced that the problem of instruction will 
have to be assumed by the public for many years to come, perhaps always. The 
public schools will have to train them for practical service at large in society, or 
in colonies when they cannot be given adequate supervision at home. While 
the chief emphasis in the training of these higher types should also be placed 



The Achievement op Subnormal Children 87 

on the development of useful forms of manumental skill and proper habits of 
social response, we are justified in devoting a reasonable amount of time, say, 
one-third, to the elements of the literary branches. Certainly the majority of 
parents would vigorousy object to the assignment of their pupils to special 
classes unless they were given some instruction in reading, spelling, writing and 
arithmetic, even if we considered all such instruction useless. Even the meagre 
results that can be secured in the literary work are in the long run, we believe, 
worth while. They are an element in rendering the mental defective slightly 
more efficient, human and happy. Most of the children we have tested had 
given from one-third to over one-half of their time to the study of reading, spell- 
ing and arithmetic. The limited potentialities of mental defects in reading, 
spelling and arithmetic have been shown in the preceding pages and will be 
referred to again in section 5 below. 

If we disregard the exercises which are too difficult, there is a patent improve- 
ment in arithmetic ability from grade to grade, from intelligence category to 
intelligence category, when the comparison is confined to. the major categories 
(the backward excepted), and from intelligence age to intelligence age (B.-S.). 
We found the same result in the oral reading test and Starch spelling lists. 
In the Ayres spelling lists there were numerous exceptions, due, undoubtedly, 
to the way in which the teachers selected the pupils for the different columns! 
While there are exceptions, we have found that the chronological and B.-S. 
ages and the amount of time spent in school increase as we ascend in all the 
classifications in all of these tests, i. e., the spelling, reading and arithmetic 
tests. Undoubtedly this accounts for the improvements found in the tests, 
just as the losses or lack of gains which have been noted are accounted for, 
at least in part, by the exceptions found to these general tendencies. The 
reason that the backward did poorer than the borderline in all of the dif- 
ferent tests is that they were younger and had not attended school as long as 
the borderline. 

The largest gains were made in grade II compared with grade I, and b}' the 
morons compared with the imbeciles, in all three types of tests while the B.-S. 
age in which the largest gain was made is not the same in the spelling, read- 
ing and arithmetic tests. The great improvement made by the second grade 
pupils is probably due to the fact that the first grade pupils (at least among 
normals) are engaged in gaining control of the mere mechanics or tools of 
spelling, reading and number. It is also probable that pupils were classified 
in the first grade who were of kindergarten or sub-first status. The great im- 
provement among the morons is due to the inclusion of large numbers of im- 
beciles who could not function at all in the tests. In fact, from the pedagog- 
ical point of view the upper limit of imbeciUty may perhaps most properly be 
drawn, and often actually is drawn, at the intelligence level where only the 
merest rudiments of spelling, reading and arithmetic can be acquired, and 
then only after protracted drill. The imbecile is located at the very bottom 
of the capacity curves for reading, spelling and arithmetic, while the highest 
grade idiot does not even approach the zero point of the curves. He is entire- 
ly extra-human with respect to the ability to acquire reading, spelling or 
arithmetic. The young infant suffers from a similar temporary inability. 
With the idiot the inability amounts to a permanent disability. 

The lack of norms for the first two grades greatly limits the value of the 
spiral arithmetic exercises for determining both the relative improvement and 



88 Miami University 

the relative status of subnormal children. We have emphasized the same 
limitations in the Ayres spelling lists. Steps should be taken to supply norms 
for the missing grades. 

4 The relative improvement in the subnormal group is much greater than in 
the normal group in grade four compared with grade three, and possibly in 
the lower grades also. In the reading test the subnormals clearly improved 
more with ascending grade than the normals, while in the spelling tests, 
possibly due to the fact that the children were partly selected, as we explained 
before, the results are discrepant. It should not be forgotten that the subnor- 
mals usually made lower scores than the normals classified in the same grade, 
and that they were considerably older. In experiments with the Seguin form 
board we found that the subnormals improved more than the normal pupils, 
but the relatively greater gain was in the younger ages.* It is probable that 
the subnormals would not continue to gain more than the normals as we 
ascend higher and higher in the grades. The subnormals would reach their 
limit of development sooner than the normals. Probably the chief reason that 
subnormals often improve more than normals is that they make lower initial 
scores. 

5 While the exact efficiency status of the different grades of our subnormals 
cannot be exactly determined because of the inadequacy of the norms, we 
may point out that only in two arithmetic exercises were the averages, based 
on all of the subnormals who had been examined, equal to 50% of the normal 
IIP scores. In the large majority of the exercises our third grade subnormals 
did less than 70% as well as the IIP normals, our fourth grade subnormals 
surpassed the IV^ normals in ten tests, while our IX-year subnormals were 
equal to or surpassed the normal III* pupils in about half of the exercises. 
Only the minority of the special school pupils included in these groupings had 
been classified as feeble-minded. The pupils classified as backward did from 
63% to 86 fo as well as the normal IIP pupils in six tests. 

In discussing the achievements of the highest grade of feeble-minded pupils 
(frequently referred to as morons), let us specially emphasize that we use the 
term "feeble-minded" in its fundamental social connotation, which alone can 
serve as the basis for a legal definition. Moreover, we use the word in conform- 
ity with recent British and American statutory definitions.! 

According to the English Mental Deficiency Act of 1913, the feeble-minded 
are defined as "Persons in whose case there exists from birth or from an 
early age mental defectiveness not amounting to imbecility, yet so pronounced 
that they require care, supervision, and control for their own protection or 
for the protection of others." If the social and industrial dependency or 
incompetency cannot be ascribed to mental deficiency, the condition, clearly, 
is not one of feeble-mindedness. 

The definition of a feeble-minded person in Missouri is contained in a bill 
which we introduced in the legislature through the Children's Code 
Commission governing the commitment of feeble-minded persons to state 
colonies, and which was enacted into law in May, 1919. (But vetoed by the 

*Psycho-motor Norms for Practical Diagnosis, 1916, p. 28. 

tin one of our western states, however, the feeble-minded person has been defined as one 
who does not develop beyond a Xll-year level of intelligence. The weakness of this 
academic definition of feeble-mindedness will be stressed on a later page. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 89 

governor for reasons which had nothing to do with the merits of the bill.) 
Under the provisions of this act, the legal definition of a feeble-minded 
person reads as follows: 

"The words 'feeble-minded person' shall be construed to mean any person 
afflicted with mental defectiveness from birth or from an early age, so 
pronounced that he is incapable of managing himself and his affairs and of 
subsisting by his own efforts, or of being taught to do so, and who requires 
supervision, control and care for his own welfare, or for the welfare of others, 
or for the welfare of the community, and who cannot be classified as an 
insane person." The legal definition in Illinois, adopted in 1915, is practically 
the same. 

In view of everything that has been written on the subject during the last 
few years it is surprising to find that some psychological, social and medical 
writers are still insisting on the obsolete definition of the English Royal Com- 
mission, which from the standpoint of logical requirement is defective both in 
connotation and denotation and which from the standpoint of practical work- 
ability is quite impossible. It is evidently because of these facts that the defini- 
tion was abandoned by England herself in 1913. It cannot be too strongly 
insisted that the word "feeble-minded" should never be used except in its 
social and legal implications. To be sure, feeble-mindedness can be located at 
any point in an I. Q. scale— at 60, 70, 80 or 90, to suit anyone's whim— or any- 
where in an intelligence age scale, but the significance of such a definition is 
academic and theoretical, and it can not be converted into a formula for pro- 
nouncing a person "incapable of managing himself and his affairs and of 
subsisting by his own efforts" because of innate or early acquired mental defici- 
ency, unless the degree of mental deficiency is so serious that there can be no 
doubt of the individual's social dependency. Examiners who are not specialists 
on feeble-mindedness in all its fundamental aspects should not employ the term 
at all. They should be satisfied to classify the individual as "mentally infe- 
rior," or "subnormal" or employ some analogous term. To employ the term 
feeble-mindedness in the loose way in which it has been used in the United 
States during the last decade, and to publish exaggerated statistics of feeble- 
mindedness, is to do science a disservice, however lofty the intentions may be. 

What do we find, then, with respect to the morons? In only one exercise did 
the morons exceed 36% of normal IIP efficiency. Only a few individuals did 
better than third grade in any of these exercises, and it is questionable 
whether some of these could properly be adjudged feeble-minded on the basis 
of the social criterion. Had the norms been available it is probable that the 
average efficiency of the highest grade of feeble-minded children would have 
been found to be somewhere in the second grade. This conclusion is in 
harmony with the results of our earlier study. 88% of the pupils then graded 
by the teachers did from sub-kindergarten to second grade work, 11% did 
third grade work and only one was graded higher than third grade. Some of 
those doing third grade work were not feeble-minded.* In the spelling tests 
we found that the morons on the average did not do better than second grade 
work in theAyres lists and less than second grade in Starch's lists, while in 
the Gray oral reading test we found that they reached the third quarter of the 
second grade. In other words, the morons, after having reached 13 years of 
age and after having spent almost six years in school, did not do better than 

«^e Pedagogical Status of the Feeble-Minded School Children, The Elementary School 
Journal, 1918, p. 594. 



90 Miami University 

normal children of eight or nine. As we have already pointed out, there are 
exceptional individuals, of course, who may do better. 

It is evident that this conclusion does not support the claim that the major- 
ity of "morons" are found in the fourth, fifth and sixth grades, while it also 
calls into question the wide-spread custom of assigning pupils to special day 
classes for the feeble-minded and of committing children as feeble-minded to 
custodial institutions who do work in the fourth, fifth and sixth grades.* 
Such pupils should be sent to ungraded classes instead of special schools for 
mental defectives, and if they are committed to custodial institutions as 
incompetents the incompetency must be justified on other grounds than 
mental deficiency, or inability to do successful work in or beyond the third 
grade. 

Until within recent times no attempt was ever made rigidly to determine 
the upper limit of feeble-mindedness either in terms of intelligence capacity 
or scholastic capacity. That under these conditions children were mistakenly 
assigned to special classes or committed to institutions as mental defectives 
should occasion no surprise. Manifestly it could frequently not be predicted 
whether a young retardate would or would not be socially incompetent as an 
adult. No facts have been produced during the last decade, in spite of the 
progress made, which have demonstrated scientifically and unequivocally, 
that all pupils must be classified as feeble-minded who merely have the 
capacity to do third grade work, and certainly not if they can do work beyond 
the third grade. On the other hand, the conclusion which we have reached 
regarding the possible pedagogical attainments of children whom we have 
felt justified in classing as feeble-minded on the basis of a careful examination 
and years of reports and observations of the work of many of them, is in 
complete harmony with the deductions of British, French and American 
writers who have had extensive experience with the feeble-minded. 

Mrs. Hume Pinsent, the founder of the Birmingham After-Care Committee, 
found that in the special schools for mental defectives in Birmingham the best 
of the pupils at the age of 16 were "able to read and calculate to about the 
same extent as a normal child of eight or nine." These pupils averaged about 
three years older than our highest grade of mental defectives. With three 
additional years of instruction our pupils would undoubtedly grade somewhat 
higher in the tests we gave. Tredgold likewise, in commenting on the most 
intelligent of a class of pupils of the average age of 12 in a typical public day 
school in London, remarks: "excluding a few children— who in my opinion, are 
not really defective— it may be said that the scholastic acquirements of none of 
these children come up to normal standard II." Burt, of the London public 
schools, writes: "In a survey of 600 special school children I found only 7 per 
cent up to and none above, the level of Standard II. This is equivalent to a 
scholastic age of eight. Evidently those who control the retransferences to 
the ordinary school have decided that a child, on reaching the scholastic age 
of about nine, shall be deemed no longer fit for retention in a special school 
for the mentally deficient." Binet, speaking of French mental defectives, 
states that "the best endowed did not surpass the normal level of 9 or 10," 
while his co-worker, Simon, provisionally fixed at "9 years the upper level of 

mental debility (feeble-mindedness) A development equivalent to the 

normal average at 9 years of age is the minimum below which the individual 



•We have referred to this practice in Problems of Subnormality, 1917, Chapter I. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Childken 91 

is incapable of getting along without tutelage in the conditions of modern 
life." Cornell, after experience in examining mental defectives in the Phila- 
delphia schools, concluded that "the high grade feeble-minded as a rule stick 
fast" in "the third school grade." "The third grade very largely corresponds 
as a test to the ninth-year Binet test, and the great majority of high-grade 
feeble-minded children, eleven or more years of age, with exceptions either 
way, test nine years plus by the Binet and coincidentally with third grade in 
school work.* 

If these conclusions are correct, what shall be said of the diagnosis of feeble- 
mindedness which has been made of children promoted to the high school, 
and of a large number of delinquents and criminals who had been advanced 
into the middle and upper grades in the elementary schools? It may be said 
that the only evidence frequently presented that the subjects in queston were 
feeble-minded has been the fact that they were retarded over three or four 
years in intelligence by the B.-S. scale, or had an I. Q. of less than 70 or 75, 
or were unable to go beyond the Xll-year level in the B.-S. scale. There are 
two fundamental weaknesses with this type of proof of feeble-mindedness. 
First, the standards were laid down prematurely, i.e., before evidence had 
been gathered to show that they were valid. At best these standards were 
only assumptions, and should only have been used tentatively as working 
hypotheses. Second, evidence is in hand to show that the standards are too 
high. For example, four out of six students, one in the high school and five in a 
teachers' college, whom we examined by the 1911 scale would be feeble-mind- 
ed according to the Xll-year standard. All of these students have graduated 
since they were examined. We have no data on the after career of the high 
school boy, but every one of the teachers has amply demonstrated her capacity 
since she entered the teaching profession. Many delinquents and prostitutes 
have been diagnosed as "high grade morons" who scored just as high in the 
B.-S. scale as four of our students who have been quite successful as teachers. 
Other writers have presented similar facts. Thus Helen Thompson Woolley 
has pointed out that the Xll-year standard would throw into the feeble-mind- 
ed class 40% of adults studied by her who had limited experience and who 
were engaged in unskilled labor. 

The evidence has been greatly extended by the recent psychological exam- 
ination of a million and three quarter men in the United States army. The 
complete account of this work has not yet appeared in print.f The general 
tabulation, however, shows that the average intelligence level of the white 
United States soldier is 13.1 years. Some writers believe that this finding rep- 
resents the average intelligence status of the American white adult. This 
conclusion has a profound and decisive bearing on the question of the location 
of the upper limen of feeble-mindedness, which has been a matter of constant 
and pointed controversy during the last decade. We now discover that the 
intelligence standard on the basis of which dependent or delinquent persons 
have been diagnosed as "indubitably" or "definitely" feeble-minded (under 
the specific designation of "high grade morons"), falls only a small fraction 
of a year below the average intelligence level of the white American soldier 



*The references to the above citations may be found in our Problems of Subnormality,1917, pp. 
37 and 220, and in Burt's review of this book in The Eugenics Review, 1919, pp. 224-231. 

tYerkes, Robert M. (Editor), Psychological Examining in the United States Army, Memoirs of 
the National Academy of Sciences, 1921, pp. 890. 



92 Miami University 

of the selective draft and assumedly of the average white American citizen. 
Some years ago we ventured the prediction that "many millions of our citizens" 
would be found feeble-minded by the Xll-year standard. We felt at the time 
that we were conservative in our judgment. Now on the basis of the same 
standard, which is still defended and actually followed in practice by a few 
examiners in spite of the irrefutable objections which many for years have 
urged against it, we find that we would have to classify almost half of the 
American white adult population as no higher in intelligence than feeble- 
minded persons, and presumptively subject to custodial care, for those who 
have been most vigorous in promulgating and defending the Xll-year standard 
have said that morons are persons whom "we cannot prepare for a life of 
independent action. They cannot provide for themselves, much less contribute 
anything to the general welfare." In California the legislature has decreed 
that a feeble-minded person "will not develop beyond the level of the average 
child of twelve years." If the army results apply to the general population, 
as affirmed, we are forced to the conclusion that the intelligence level of 
almost half of the white citizens of that commonwealth is barely above the 
status of the high grade feeble-minded child. 

A prominent chief of a government scientific division recently related to the 
writer that a psychological investigator, enamored of the Mendelian theory, 
threw away all the data gathered in a survey because they disagreed with the 
Mendelian hypothesis. Such a spectacle is akin to the insistence that 
dependents and criminals are feeble-minded although they may have almost 
average and sometimes fully average intelligence. Some one has said that 
half of what is taught in our books and schools is not true. In one medical 
investigation the results supported this seemingly preposterous statement. 
The post mortem examinations in a London hospital showed that about half 
of the ante mortem diagnoses were incorrect. This may be an indictment 
of our low level of intelligence our — "moron" status — but we prefer to regard 
the fact merely as an indication of the enormous difficulty of the problem of 
physical diagnosis. Certainly accurate mental diagnosis is no easier. 

Fortunately for the science of clinical psychology, however, most of the 
trained psychological examiners are cautious and conservative, and free from 
hampering prepossessions as to feeble-mindedness. The directors of the army 
psychological work came to the conclusion that it was not necessary to 
examine anyone as a feeble-minded suspect unless he graded less then X-years 
in the group psychological tests (i. e., less than 15 points in the so-called Alpha 
test). No one was recommended for discharge as feeble-minded unless he 
graded less then 7.8 years mentally (Stanford scale), those who graded from 
7.8 to 10.2 were recommended for assignment to service organizations or de- 
velopment battalions, while those who graded 10.3 or higher were recom- 
mended for the regular military training. The individual records showed that any 
number of men of X-and Xl-year mentalities comported themselves properly in 
society and had been able to earn their living. In fact, instances have been 
cited of men of still lower intelligence levels who were earning good wages 
and getting along satisfactorily at large. Coal miners from West Virginia 
earning $7 a day could not pass the seven-year level. An old cavalry officer 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 93 

in a southern camp "cussed out" the neurologist who recommended the dis- 
charge of a soldier who had a seven year mentality. The officer said that this 
man was the best stable boy in the troop.* 

Certainly if the mental age of the average American citizen is 13.1, the 
mental age of the highest grade of feeble-minded person must be at least 
several years lower. If we follow the standards of feeble-minded which were 
proposed a few years ago and which are being widely followed, namely, an I. Q. 
of 70 or less or a retardation of four years or more, then the highest grade of 
mental defective (the high grade moron, so-called) would not exceed an intelli- 
gence level of 9. years.f This apparently corresponds to the standard 
which we have followed during the last nine or ten years, for when we placed 
the upper threshold of feeble -mindedness near the Xth-year, we were using the 
1908 scale which grades considerably higher than the Standford scale, except 
possibly in the higher years of the scale, which we have not had occasion to 
use with the type of cases we examine. This standard, moreover, corresponds 
to the standard of such cautious experts on the feeble-minded as Binet-Simon, 
WooUey, Cornell, and Tredgold. 

The practical importance of adopting a reasonable standard of feeble- 
mindedness should be obvious. In the first place, people have been 
committed to institutions for the feeble-minded on the X- and XI- and XII- 
year standards who have higher degrees of intelligence than many persons 
who are successful at large in society. Thus many of the children who have 
left the special schools in St. Louis and who are now making their living, 
some having a fair income, actually grade lower intellectually than children 
who have been committed to custodial institutions as feeble-minded. Like- 
wise many of the army recruits who have been economically successful in 
society had considerably less intelligence than high grade inmates in institu- 
tions for the feeble-minded. 

Is it too much to plead that no child should be committed to an institution 
for the feeble-minded until he has been carefully examined by experienced 
examiners who have specialized on the problems of mental deficiency and 
backwardness? Taking the nation as a whole it may be true, as alleged, that 
the majority of children are still certified as proper candidates for institutions 
for the feeble-minded by examiners who have never taken a single course in 



♦We have just received an interesting and valuable study of the intelligence of delinquent boys 
30% of whom are classified as feeble-minded. If we deduct the boys who had Xl-year mentalities the 
oercentage is reduced to 23.8, and if we also deduct the X-year mentalities (most of whom .grade near 
the Xl-y ear border), to 13.2. Of the 141 classified as feeble-minded all except ten, having intelhgence 
levels from X-XII, would have been recommended by the army psychologists for regular military ser- 
vice By feeble-minded persons the writer states that he means those who need constant supervision 
in even routine work, and who are unable to plan for themselves and they are therefore said to be 
incapable of managing themselves and their own affairs independently We have been forced to the 
conclusion that the large majority of subnormal delinquents are of borderline and backward degrees of 
intelligence instead of being feeble-minded: Problems of Subnormality, 1917 239-250, 181f, feeble- 
mindedness and Delinquency, Mental Hygiene, 1917, 585f; Criminal Irresponsibility Journal of Delm- 
auency 1916 250f . The high percentage of feeble-mindedness reported among our delinquents is due 
to the fact that they have been a highly selected group. Most of them were referred for examination 
because they were thought to be mentally defective. ... ^ •. r ui ■ ^ a " t-u^* ^^^.r 

tTerman has affirmed that an I. Q. below 70 indicates definite feeble-mindedness, that many 
with a still higher I. Q. are also feeble-minded, that age sixteen which represents adult intelligence is 
the highest age that can be used to determine the I. Q. of an adult. On the basis of this standard an 
adult or an adolescent of 16 or over, would be feeble-minded when retarded only two.years in intelli- 
gence according to the army average of adult intelligence. Aside from the inherent improbability of 
such a standard, let us not forget that the age norms in the Stanford scale are based on so few cases, 
especially in some ages, that we are not justified in assuming that they are satisfactorily accurate and 
can be applied without modification to the intellience rating of any person anywhere. The army 
average varies surprisingly from the Stanford adult average. 



94 Miami University 

mental deficiency, who have very hazy ideas as to what constitutes feeble- 
mindedness, and whose diagnosis is based either on common sense consider- 
ations rather than expert Icnowledge, or on arbitrary standards of intelligence 
deficiency as determined by some measuring scale of intelligence. 

In the second place, thousands of children throughout the country have been 
assigned as feeble-minded on the basis of the above and allied standards to 
classes for mental defectives in the public schools who have not been feeble- 
minded. This may not seem to be a matter of any consequence, but we 
personally know of many instances where such assignment proved to be a 
detriment to the pupils, who were actually held back by the slow pace of the 
feeble-minded children and by the inexperience of the teachers with the work 
in the higher grades. We have removed from special classes for the feeble- 
minded children who are now doing "good" and "excellent" work in the upper 
elementary grades and in high school. Their cases are little less than tragic. 
Had they been retained in the special schools for mental defectives they would 
not have gone beyond the fourth or fifth grades before leaving school. 
Assignments to special classes must be made with far greater care in the 
future than has been the case in the past. This cannot be done unless the 
schools secure the services of experienced and trained experts on mentally 
handicapped children. 

Pupils who have the capacity to do good all-round third grade work should 
not be assigned to special classes for the feeble-minded save under exceptional 
conditions. They should be assigned to ungraded classes designed for chil- 
dren of higher degrees of intelligence. The minimum requirement for handling 
subnormal children when there is a sufficient number of different grades of 
subnormals in the school system, calls for the organization of special schools 
for the mentally defective (feeble-minded), and ungraded classes for the 
backv/ard and restoration types. The majority of the borderline should be 
assigned to the ungraded classes. When feasible only the borderline who will 
eventually probably prove to be feeble-minded should be assigned to the 
special schools. Our insistence that backward children should not be assigned 
to the special schools for the feeble-minded except under very special 
circumstances is in complete harmony with Binet's views. Obviously where 
only one class is available it must serve as a clearing house for various grades 
of mental deficients. But the backward child should be returned from such 
a class to the grades as soon as the instruction in the grades meets his needs 
better than the instruction in the special class. We have discussed the 
organization of different types of special classes in some detail in Problems of 
Subnormality, 1921, Chapter III. 

6. Relatively to the normal pupils, the feeble-minded and subnormal pupils do 
worst in fractions and divison, and best in addition. 

7. The boys tend to surpass the girls in arithmetical work, especially in 
division and subtraction. On the other hand, the girls excelled in the reading 
test, and possibly in the spelling tests, although the results are somewhat 
equivocal in spelling. We do not yet know the significance or implications of 
these sex differences in the literary subject matter either among normals or 
subnormals: whether the differences can be leveled by added drills, whether it 
is desirable to level them or to increase them, and whether the literary course 
of study should differ for boys and girls because of these differences. The 
opinion has been frequently expressed that the reason there are more 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 95 

pedagogical retardates among boys than among girls in the elementary schools 
is the fact that the dominantly literary character of our elementary curriculum 
appeals more to the interests of girls than boys. In response to this 
conviction many forms of manumental work for boys have been introduced 
into the elementary course. At the present time, however, the tendency is 
perhaps equally strong to introduce various forms of manual work especially 
suited to girls. This question is in need of intensive investigation. 
The variability in the arithmetic exercises is very great, the quartile deviation 
ranging from 36% to 86% of the average scores in the different grades. How 
much larger the variability is for subnormal than normal pupils cannot at 
present be determined. There were some pupils who failed completely in 
every grade except in two exercises in grade III, and seven exercises in grade 
IV. The number of pupils who were conspicuously weak in number work is 
very considerable. It has usually been stated, and we believe it is true, that 
mental defectives have less ability in arithmetic than in any other literary 
branch. This is no doubt due to the highly abstract nature of number and 
numerical operations. At the same time, the mathematical incapacity of some 
of these children is probably due to a specific weakness in number imagery or 
number concepts, a condition comparable to visual aphasia in the realm of 
reading. There are also subnormal children who have special ability in 
number work although we did not find any one with very conspicuous ability. 
The literature occasionally refers to "mathematical prodigies" who are 
imbeciles. But these defectives are probably morons or unstables rather than 
imbeciles. 

We found similar conditions with respect to variability to obtain in spelling 
and reading. 

It is evident that, hard as it is to teach the literary subjects to mental 
defectives, the problem is far more difficult when the mentally defective child 
is also specifically handicapped. When there is a specific defect in his visual 
word, letter and number imagery the problem is practically insoluble. In the 
case of children of higher degrees of intelligence suffering from this condition, 
favorable results are frequently obtained after protracted drill, especially 
when efficient methods are employed. We believe that there are more 
children of fair or normal intelligence who suffer from defect in visual word, 
letter and number imagery than has been supposed, and that the time is ripe 
for the organization of experimental classes for these types. This will lead 
to the intensive study of the pedagogy or word blindness in all its forms. 
Although, as we have seen, the proficiency in arithmetic, as well as in spelling 
and reading, tends to increase with increasing intelligence age, the variability 
is so great that it would not be possible to classify pupils in any of these 
subjects purely on the basis of the intelligence age. The intelligence age, or 
general supernormality or subnormality, is only one factor to be considered 
in the pedagogical classification of pupils. Among other important factors 
which must be taken into account, are specific mental and pedagogical defects 
and talents and the pupil's stage of instruction. The proper classification of 
a child for purposes of instruction must have regard for all these factors, 
while with certain types the physical and nervous condition must also be 
considered. 

Let us emphasize, in conclusion, a point of great practical importance which 
we have already stressed and which has been implicit in many of I the 
statements which we have already made: the problem of psychological and 



96 Miami University 

educational diagnosis is not simple, but exceedingly complex. There are 
many conditions which superficially appear to be similar, but which are quite 
dissimilar. This is not surprising when we consider that there are all grades 
of mental subnormality imperceptibly shading into each other and often 
inextricably intertwined with co-existent specific mental and physical defects. 
But the direction of progress in education and social service (as in medicine) 
is in differentiating more and more sharply the various degrees of quantitative 
deviation in intelligence and to identify more and more accurately specific 
abnormalities which we find in the mentally handicapped. Only thus shall we 
be able adequately to differentiate our courses of study to meet individual 
needs. There is no justification for differentiating pupils at all for instruction 
unless by so doing we can more effectively minister to the child's particular 
needs. If this is true, then we must continue to differentiate pupils into more 
and more groups just so long as the finer groupings will make possible a more 
effective adaptation of our educative processes. It is particulary important to 
differentiate feeble-mindedness from other degrees of intelligence deficiency 
and from various other handicaps and specific defects which may border on, 
resemble or simulate it, such as motor, visual and auditory aphasia, speech 
defects, sensory defects, psychopathic, psychotic or neurotic disorders, social 
and educational neglect, etc. In order that educationally abnormal children 
may be carefully differentiated the schools should have the services of 
examiners who are not only versed in clinical psychology and mental tests, and 
elementary and corrective pedagogy, but who have expert knowledge of 
various types of abnormal school children. 



REFERENCES 

Besides the standard medical and educational texts on the feeble-minded, consult 
the following: 

Gesell, Arnold— Exceptional Children and Public School Policy, 1921, p. 66. 

GODDARD, Henry H.— School Training of Defective Children, 1920, p. 97. 

HousER, J. D.— The Relation Between Spelling Ability and General Intelligence, The 

Elementary School Journal, 1915-16, pp. 100-109. 
LiNDLEY, Martha — The Reading Ability of Feeble-Minded Children, Training School 

Bulletin, 1917, 90f. 
Merrill, Maud A.— The Relation of Intelligence to Ability in the "Three R's" in the 

Case of Retarded Children, The Pedagogical Seminary, 1921, pp. 249-274. 

The Ability of Special Class Children in the "Three R's," 

Pedagogical Seminary, 1918, pp. 88-96. 
MiTCHEL, David— Schools and Classes for Exceptional Children, 1916, p. 122. 
Murdoch, Katherine — Rate of Improvement of the Feeble-Minded as shown by 

Standardized Educational Tests, Journal of Applied Psychology, 1918. 
Renshaw, Samuel— The Abilities of Pupils in Detroit Prevocational Classes, Journal 

of Educational Psychology, 1919, pp. 83-94. 
Wallin, J. E. Wallace — The Pedagogical Status of the Feeble-Minded Children, 

The Elementary School Journal, 1918, pp. 588-597. 

^The Achievement of Mental Defectives in Standardized 

Educational Tests, School and Society, 1919, pp. 250-256. 



The Achievement of Subnormal Children 97 

■ Report of the Psycho-Educational Clinic and Special 

Schools, in Report of the Board of Education of the City of St. Louis for 1918-1919, 
pp. 68-75. 

-Suggested Rules for Special Classes, Educational Admin- 



istration and Supervision, 1921, pp. 447-458. 

Problems of Subnormality, 1921, Chapter III. 

WooDROW, Herbert— Brightness and Dullness in Children, 1919, p. 254ff. 

WooLLEY, Helen T.— Feeble-Minded Ex-School Children, Studies from the Helen S. 

Trounstine Foundation, 1921, pp. 237-264. 



Through an error of the stenographer, the figures have been omitted on page 8 
for the backward and normal cases, and for Binet-Simon ages above VII. 



I have been assisted in the correction of the proofs by my assistant. Miss 
Mildred Rothhaar. 




M 



TBESS 

OHIO STATE 
BEPOBMATOB\ 



